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COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



THE ETERNAL CRUSADE 

POEMS OF 
WAR AND PHILOSOPHY 



BY 

WILLIAM PEGRAM : 

Author of "A Diagnosis" 




BOSTON 

SHERMAN, FRENCH & COMPANY 

1917 



-Tt>3^^\'( 







vi 



JUN 30 1917 

COPYHIGHT, 1917 

Shermax, Fbench & Company 



©CLA470124 



Strife of the body, spirit, and the mind 
But represent our Mother Nature's way 
Of teaching wisdom to our fleeting day 
Through effort towards an ever higher 

goal; 
And 'neath the surface ice must surely 

find 
That righteous war should ne'er he 

glanced askance. 
For hut through strife we prosper and 

advance 
To higher standards of the mind and 

soul. 



CONTENTS 

POEMS OF WAR 

PAGE 

Ave! Belgique! 1 

The Teuton Mind 4 

Neutrality 7 

Awake! My Country! 10 

War 12 

To THE U-BoAT 19 

" A Scrap of Paper " 21 

The Lusitania Crime 26 

Nationalism or Individualism? 30 

" Divine Right " 36 

The Invisible Army 39 

Antichrist 42 

Smitten Flanders 45 

Francis Joseph 48 

The New " Kingdom of Poland " .... 50 

The Patriotic Hymn 51 

The German Peace Proposal 54 

A Protest 59 

The Answer 63 

The True Prayer 66 

Contradistinction 70 

What Is Our Aim? 72 

To Europe 74 

Our Duty 75 

The Entente Reply 77 

Why Are We Careless? 80 

The Demand 84 

" Entangling Alliances " 85 



PAGE 

To THE Entente Allies 89 

The German Mexican Plot and Its Attempted 

Justification 90 

Realization 91 

POEMS OF PHILOSOPHY 

Civilization 97 

Tradition's Sway . 100 

Life 102 

Mysteries 114 

The Riddle of the Universe 117 

Progressing Continuity 120 

A Possible Gain! 124 

Thoughts on a Dew-Drop 128 

Words 134 

Intolerance 136 

Prejudice 139 

Curiosity 142 

" Holy Matrimony " 144 

True Affinity 149 

True Divorce 156 

Sex 160 

Birth Control 165 

The New, but Ancient, Strife . . . . . 172 
The Metamorphosis of Charity . . . .180 
The Modern Man with the Muck-rake . .186 

The Vision of Reform 188 



POEMS OF WAR 



AVE! BELGIQUE! 

Hail! Little Belgium! Land I love so well! 
How greatly doth my heart go out to thee 1 
How sadly on thy wrongs my mind doth dwell 
In this, thine hour of dire adversity ! 

How well I love thy quaint, secluded spots ; 
Thy little hamlets nestling in the plain; 
Thy hills and dales of verdant loveliness ; 
Thy greening pastures and thy yellowing grain ! 

Within thine ancient Bruges I've stopped and 

dreamed, 
Afloat upon thy silent waterways — 
Those sluggish arteries of thine that seemed 
To hold the life of long-forgotten days ! 

And, in thy gay and giddy capital, 
How many happy hours I have spent there, 
Lingering within thy parks and streets and ways 
That breathe of modern — as of ancient — days ! 

And, of all parks, thine own Foret de Soignes 

Is, in my mind, enthroned as the one 

That least of form, but most of beauty, shows ! 

Its wondrous beeches — huge, magnificent — 
That tower with so much grace, such lofty air, 
Make us, indeed, feel insignificant. 
And move to tones subdued, or silent prayer ! 

[1] 



E'en now — though years have come and gone 

again 
Since last I saw them in their mighty prime — 
They bring a sense of peace that doth remain 
Undimmed, untarnished by the lapse of time ! 

That peace, howe'er, is mine — unknown to thee ; 
For peace again how canst thou ever feel — 
Thou who hast died the death but to be free ! — 
While ever ground beneath the intruder's heel? 

And what thy crime that hast brought down upon 

Thy head this arrogant, barbaric horde? 

Thy crime and Virtue seem to me as one. 

For thou hast died to keep thy plighted word ! 

Cursed be the traitor ! And thrice cursed shall 

seem 
His reason, motive and his unjust cause; 
His pride, his arrogance, his self-esteem. 
His veiled contempt of all the Moral Laws ! 

And children who, as yet, are at the breast — 
Yea ! children who are e'en, as yet, unborn — 
With deepest loathing shall his name detest 
As one unknown to truth — the one forsworn ! 

His name shall be a by-word on the earth; 
The pariah nation ; outcast ; thing unclean 
That prostituted all its moral worth 
To dreams of avarice, debased and mean ! 
[2] 



But — like the phoenix from its ashes — Thou 
Shalt come again to life — again shalt rise — 
While all the nations of the earth shall bow 
To Thee, thy sufferings and thy sacrifice! 

April, 1916. 



m 



THE TEUTON MIND 

Of all the things this world war has revealed, 
The strangest of them all, I seem to find, 
Is that crude structure, hitherto concealed. 
That weird, fantastic thing — the Teuton Mind ! 
'Tis useless to attempt to understand ! 
From fruitless effort better far refrain 
Than make such an unlimited demand 
Upon the process of the normal brain ! 
To follow e'en its strange and devious way — 
Each crooked, tortuous, disingenuous bend — 
Would crease the forehead, turn the hair to grey 
And lead to thought-stagnation in the end ! 
But, throughout all its rambling sophistry. 
One tho't stands ever constant, clear and strong. 
The firm conviction that it must be right — 
That all who differ must, perforce, be wrong! 
Conviction worthy of a better cause! 
Conviction prostituted to Desire ! 
Its own desire — the apex of all laws ! 
The final goal to which it must aspire ! 
Self-centred, self-obsessed and self-inspired! 
Self-prostituted, self-conceived and born ! 
What other progeny could be — so sired — 
Than this incestuous, self-extolling spawn? 
This bastard offspring of perverted thought — 
Debased, ignoble, self-deceiving lust — 
With dire results unto itself is fraught, 
Inspiring, elsewhere, naught but deep disgust ! 
What room is there within this world today 
[4.] 



For this strange shape of blind perversity 
That thinks it naught to lie, to steal, to slay — 
This Hydra-headed Incongruity? 
Such things as Honor, Virtue, Probity, 
It seems unable even to conceive ! 
Its plighted word — a thing of nullity. 
Quite unimportant ever to retrieve ! 
According to it, black is also white ; 
And two and two, not four, but rather three ! 
For naught is e'er apparent to its sight 
If otherwise than it would have it be ! 
Its given word means " yes " today, but " no " 
Upon tomorrow, if 'twere better so 
To fit its plans, conform with its desire, 
Or gain that which advantage would require ! 
Those other nations who now, with her, fight. 
Support her motives and her bloody creed. 
Would seem less moved by justice and by right 
Than by ignoble, avaricious greed ! 
Why should a treaty ever block its way ? 
Another's property respect demand? 
For those who disagree have gone astray — 
Deserve not life, nor liberty, nor land ! 
To follow in its labyrinthine path, 
Attempt to justify, excuse, atone, 
Would turn the mind to topsy-turvydom 
And make our reason abdicate its throne ! 
And still it juggles words and prates of laws, 
Divine and human ; speaks of wrong and right 
As though they had a meaning and a cause 
To one whose only god is that of Might ! 
[5] 



But we are told that whom they would destroy 

The gods make mad ! If so it truly be, 

The time of reckoning would seem at hand 

For this, a race steeped in insanity ! 

Could it but see the error of its way 

Before the opportunity has fled, 

And thus, in part at least, avert or stay 

Just retribution hov'ring o'er its head ! 

If only now it would admit its fault; 

Confess its error ; bury deep its hate ; 

And sue for pardon 'fore an outraged world 

That's now in arms — before it be too late ! 

But this, perchance, is too much to expect 

Of this deluded mind, and, therefore, it 

Must learn, from sad experience, respect 

For other minds with more of native wit ! 

As yet, its self-sufficiency is such 

That doubt of self no lodgment, still, may find, 

But, in the end, 'twill prove a broken crutch — 

Revealing weakness was as strength opined ! 

Thus we can only leave it to its fate ! 

Its pride, its arrogance, its senseless hate ! 

Its self-assurance, self-deception, all 

Those strange obliquities of it that pall 

So greatly on all others that distrust 

Has turned to nausea and intense disgust! 

But, in this present age we deemed refined, 

When Moral Law and Ethics are combined 

To teach us life, 'tis strange, indeed, to find 

A crude survival like this Teuton Mind ! 

May, 1916. 

[6] 



NEUTRALITY 

What is this thing we call " Neutrality "? 
This shop-worn term of pure banality ! 
This thing of make-believe, devoid of heart, 
That in another's wrongs would take no part ! 
Can we be neutral 'twixt the right and wrong? 
Can we be neutral 'tween the weak and strong? 
Can we regard, alike, the true and just 
And those that breathe but arrogance and lust? 
Who holds such purpose — if he truly can — ■■ 
Is naught but some strange travesty of Man, 
Who lacks both soul and spirit, brain and heart — 
A sexless thing, from other men apart! 
And what authority for this, his stand. 
Apart from that which weakness would command? 
What prophet, of the present or the past, 
Would such insinuation, 'pon us, cast? 
What Law of Nature, or what Law of Man — 
What law, divine or human, — can we find 
That advocates such a defenseless plan 
As thus to stultify the human mind? 
Neutrality 'twixt ruffian and child? 
Neutrality between the sane and mad? 
Neutrality 'twixt civilized and wild? 
Neutrality between the good and bad? 
Neutrality, indeed, 'twixt strong and strong ! 
'Twixt right and right, or, e'en 'twixt wrong and 

wrong! 
But can there ever be neutrality 
Between the Truth and Immorality? 

m 



The vain attempt but shows how vain the cause ! 

For Truth 'pon Sophistry forever wars ! 

And what vain human edict can annul 

Divine and primal, fundamental laws? 

The law that tells not only of our rights, 

But of our obligations unto all ! 

That whispering conscience which the guilty 

frights 
And topples arrogance unto a fall ! 
That law which utter selfishness doth lead, 
At last, if followed, in the fatal way 
Wherein 'tis but devoured by its own greed 
And sacrifices self, the debt to pay ! 
E'en He, the man we call The Prince of Peace, 
Ne'er taught such doctrine, or would have us seek 
To give to arrogance such free release 
To work its will upon the helpless weak ! 
He ne'er advised such a neutrality 
Between the unjust, as against the just. 
Or taught such impotent morality 
As thus to bow before devouring lust ! 
And he who thus commends dishonors Him — 
Dishonors Nature and his higher self — 
And sells his birthright for a faulty whim. 
For ease, for comfort, or for paltry pelf! 
Neutrality of action we may hold 
If, lacking strength, or this our help not sought, 
But who so void of reason, or so bold 
As thus to ask neutrality of thought? 
Heaven protect the land that must rely 
'Pon those alone who raise the neutral cry ! 

m 



Succor such country ! Aid its weakness, then, 
If but defended by such neutral men ! 
God grant that this, our land, has few indeed 
Who bow to such a base, decadent creed — 
That thus attempt, with sophistry, to blind 
The truer insight of the human mind ! 
God grant it be not ! But if, truly, so 
That we have sunk to depths so mean and low, 
At least grant recognition of the state 
And ope' our eyes before it be too late ! 

May, 1916. 



[9] 



AWAKE! MY COUNTRY! 

Awake ! my Country ! Waken and prepare ! 
And cease thy foolish dream of slothful peace ! 
For who prepared to do, if not to dare? 
And who'd be free must, first, his mind release ! 

Release thy mind from that o'ermastering thought, 
That others' fate can never be thine own — 
A crude self-blindness with such danger fraught 
That, in full anguish, we may yet atone ! 

This self-deception might have had some weight 
In former years of universal trust, 
Ere yet the savage had unmasked his hate — 
Given free rein to his devouring lust ! 

But with the bleeding, devastated lands 

And ravished women, full before our eyes. 

What reason thus to idly hold thy hands 

And treat impatience with such feigned surprise? 

With nursing infants stricken at the breast — 
With crimes at which the coldest brain would sour, 
How canst thou dawdle in unthinking rest 
And, unimproved, dismiss the passing hour? 

With this unbridled arrogance let loose — 
This moral blindness stalking o'er the earth — 
Have you, for mind and brain, no other use 
Than thus to self-delusion to give birth? 
[10] 



As Nero fiddled as the city burned, 
Art thou, like him, to soulless skeptic turned? 
Dost in fools' paradise insist to dwell — 
Ne'er recking, in the end, may prove a hell ? 

Why is it that the men to whom we look 
For this, our safety, cannot seem to see? 
Have they responsibility forsook. 
Or see but things as they would have them be? 

Is't strange we grow impatient at delay? 
That disappointment's mixed with just resent 
At those who represent us in this way — 
Representation to misrepresent ! 

And who cries " Peace ! " when there's, indeed, no 

peace. 
Had better from his foolish lisping cease, 
And use what brain has been vouchsafed to him. 
By application, somewhat to increase ! 

But, thro' the length and breadth of this fair land. 
Full many wake, and many understand — 
That which our leaders fail, indeed, to see — 
That this, our course, leads not to Liberty ! 

Awake ! my Country ! Contemplate thy fate ! 
E'en if thy watchmen slumber at the gate ! 
Of overweening confidence beware ! 
Awake ! my Country ! Waken and prepare ! 
May, 1916. 

[11] 



WAR 

When, like a monstrous bolt from out the blue, 

War broke upon a world all unprepared 

For such a shock, we could indeed but rue 

The day itself, and hardly one that dared 

To think that from the cataclysmic stroke 

That e'er to fiercer furies hurried on, 

A fuller consciousness might be awoke 

And new and higher standards grasped and 

won! 
Be won by all, but most, in tiiith, by those 
Who here wage battle for a righteous cause 
And, armed with an inner strength, oppose 
Those who enshrined 'bove all the God of Wars — 
Those who, confronting Right and Might, had 

chose' 
The latter, in contempt of higher laws ! 

The calm, serene and trusting ways of peace 
Had led us to believe that war and strife 
Had been outgrown — that both must ever cease 
To stir, disrupt and scourge a nation's life 
That to the softer ways of peace had grown — 
That trade and commerce would so closely lock 
The arms of all, with myriad lines outthrown, 
That none could stand the hard resultant shock 
Of war, whereby we came, indeed, to think 
That war — great war — again could never be, 
E'en while, in truth, we tottered on the brink 
Of this — the greatest war in history ! 
[12] 



Thus did we idle in the passing day, 

Thus think and dream — and other thought de- 
plore — 

Making no effort to avert or stay 

That cankering growth, corrupted at the core. 

Which — ; come to head at last — did turn and 
rend 

A whole world's peace — a half world's strength 
and life — 

And prompted all to wake, arise, defend, 

Or perish in a common bloody strife! 

And, when the tempest broke, is't strange that 

we — 
Thus seeing all hypotheses o'erthrown. 
Our dreams of lasting peace dispersed and flown — 
Were lost in utter doubt and failed to see 
That from the ashes of the bloody strife — 
The fetid vapors of the trodden field — 
Would come the birth of full and higher life 
Which, to posterity, must surely yield 
A rich and plenteous harvest, be the cost 
At present great and much, now, seeming lost? 
For, in the fiery furnace of the fray, 
What strength developed — weaknesses out- 
grown ! — 
A planting which, in later harvest day. 
Will show to what good purpose here was sown 
The blood and treasure, self-denial, pain, 
Which, in our children's children, may atone 
For all the cost — and bloom to life again ! 
[IS] 



The ways of peace, the luxuries of wealth, 

Self-centred thought and calm, complacent ease 

May, in themselves, but undermine the health — 

Produce a slow but ravaging disease 

Which, if unchecked, in its insidious stealth 

May wreck the life of nations it doth seize ! 

Perchance in some the virus had begun 

To gain control, to exercise its sway, — 

In others e'en a fuller course had run — 

And war, mayhap, may indicate the way 

That Nature takes to purge us of the ill — 

Heroic measures that, indeed, may stay 

The cancerous growth that, otherwise, would kill. 

And who so wise to say it is not so ? 

Who so advanced in learning's foremost van 

As to deny and, thus, profess to know 

Her inner purpose and her hidden plan? 

Can childhood look with calm, unwav'ring eye 

Upon the surgeon's keen and cutting knife 

And, 'neath his fear and pain, indeed descry 

The fact that it alone can save his life? 

Does not the knife, to him, appear to be 

A greater menace than the dread disease? 

Can we expect indeed that he shall see 

That through such bloody means come health and 

ease? 
And are not we all children when we come 
To gauge our ailments or attempt to find, 
Of all our many weaknesses, the sum 
Of those attacking body, soul and mind? 
[14] 



Had not we better amputate an arm 

If so we must than, failing to, be led 

To greater loss — a more o'erwhelming harm — 

That in this life can ne'er be remedied ? 

For what one arm — or both indeed — if we 

In saving them but jeopardize the whole? 

And whatsoe'er the blood and treasure be, 

They're cheaply spent in saving of the soul ! 

Thus they who heed a high and righteous call 

To arms perchance gain more, far more, than 

we — 
Stunned by the din and clamor of it all — 
Can, from our present standpoint, clearly see ! 
And, be the gain commensurate or not, — 
Be large or seeming small the final sum — 
'Tis infinitely better than a blot 
'Pon their escutcheon through the years to come ! 

And they the neutrals, if they have no cause — 
No high and righteous cause — to join the fight, 
May, through the application of the laws 
Of war, have clear, and plainly brought to sight 
Some weakness in themselves which should give 

pause. 
And, if corrected, lead to greater might ! 
A weakness both in armament and mind ; 
In men, in ships, in self-reliant force; 
A self-complacence, tendency to blind 
Their eyes to all but their accustomed course ! 
Perchance upon some other nation we 
Have far too long depended in the use 
[15] 



Of some invention or commodity 

The which we lacked incentive to produce 

By our own hand, the loss of which may spur 

Initial effort and provide excuse 

For much that former plenty did deter. 

And daily with the picture 'fore our eyes 

Of life poured out in combat with the wrong 

Must not the inspiration come to rise 

To greater heights ourselves — be firm and 

strong — 
And stimulate a true self-sacrifice 
That Right and Freedom we may help prolong ! 

And even they the purblind, even they 
Whose cause is weak, whose motive is unjust, 
They the aggressors who, indeed, would slay 
All who oppose their cruel, devouring lust — 
Perchance they too may see the light of day — 
" Perchance may see ! " — 'Twere better said they 

must 
At last perceive the error of their way 
And in some higher Godhead put their trust ! 
But as some loathsome, hidden growth is ta'en 
In time if but it outwardly expose 
Its presence, we should rather count it gain 
That, 'fore too late, it to the surface rose. 
Exposing all its foulness to the world — 
A moral foulness so intense, indeed. 
That half the earth is in the vortex hurled 
To crush its overwhelming, lustful greed ! 

[16] 



Who knows how long this cancerous growth has 

lain 
At this, the fountain of a nation's life — 
How much it has affected heart and brain — 
How much, in subtle ways, engendered strife 
Throughout the world and which, if stronger 

grown. 
Much hardly won perchance had been o'erthrown 
Ere 'twas extracted by the surgeon's knife! 
And they indeed must suffer who have thus 
Permitted this, the growth, far to progress — 
Have forced, or e'en allowed, the loathsome pus 
To poison a whole nation's consciousness ! 
And what, indeed, that nation's later stand 
When reason, open to the light of da}'. 
Shall clearly see? — what sacrifice demand 
From those who thus have led it far astray 
Through thought obscured and, with the mailM 

hand. 
Have caused it but to prostitute, betray 
Its better self, and sunk a happy land 
In depths of desolation and decay? 
And, if but human, they must come to see 
The utter foulness and the base degree 
Of this, the motive, for the coming ray 
Of light will show its depths of infamy ! 

But for their crime, or for their weakness, they 
Must meet the score — no matter what the cost — 
And generations yet unborn repay 

[17] 



What, in their frenzy, they have risked — and 

lost! 
But even they — though feeble and forlorn, 
Devoid of honor, worthy of no trust, 
A people outcast that must bear the scorn 
Of all the world for their devouring lust — 
Will, through their pain, to other ways be drawn 
And, placing in some higher god their trust. 
At last to fuller fellowship be bom ! 
But as 'tis Nature's law that we must pay 
For each excess by one that counteracts 
And so offsets, they must expect to lay 
Upon their minds the burden of those facts 
Which — come to light — will furnish but a sting 
Of self-reproach for those, their former acts, 
Until they pay the utmost reckoning! 

Thus do we dimly see, indeed, that war 

Is not all bad, contemptible and low, 

But that it may but indicate the law 

Of life by which we learn to rise and grow 

From gross to fine — from crude and low to high 

And ever higher standards of the mind ; 

A law, in fact, with which we must comply 

And, in complying, are, in time, refined 

To higher states towards which we slowly move — 

To fuller understanding of the ways 

Of Nature's primal law — the Law of Love — 

Towards which she strives humanity to raise ! 

September, 1916. 

[18] 



TO THE U-BOAT 

Stealthily, cunningly, craftily creeping, 
Down in the ocean depths, dark as the night — 
Rising at times and suspiciously peeping — 
Ready to sink again far out of sight ! 

Hasty in flight if a danger present itself — 
Proud and assertive in face of the weak — 
Stranger to pity where one can't defend himself — 
Hail ! to the submarine — dastard and sneak ! 

Hail ! to the strong-arm one, robber and foot- 
pad — 

Bludgeoned and black-jacked and garbed in a 
mask — 

Ready, if hidden, to strike in his blood-mad 

Frenzy of hate, with a smile at the task ! 

Hail ! to the cowardly laughing hyena, 
Snarling and biting where weakness is seen. 
If, of all combat, there can be a meaner 
Show but the way to the brave submarine ! 

Brother in crime of the dastardly Zeppelin — 
One common motto they worship and use : — 
" Down with humanity ! Everything but to win ! 
That alone wrong that would cause us to lose ! " 

Lacking the chivalrous courage of buccaneer — 
Basest of all that upon the seas float — 
[19] 



Down with all sentiment ! Rise all and raise a 

cheer 
For this perversion — the modern U-Boat ! 

October, 1916. 



[20] 



"A SCRAP OF PAPER" 

Perchance never before has there been writ 

In terms so short and plain — so terse and 

clear — 
A fuller, more complete indictment of 
A people we had been disposed to think 
A worthy member of the family 
Of nations, bound by many subtle ties 
Above, beyond the statutory law — 
A people whose idealism we 

Had ta'en on faith and — listening to their claims 
Of great preeminence in many fields 

Of higher thought and culture had, indeed. 

Been wont to grant them high and worthy place 

Upon the shield whereon is blazoned 

All true advance of mind and heart and soul ! 

But some, still doubting, looked upon their past 
And wondered how, indeed, 'twere possible 
For this, a race so crude in many ways — 
So firmly wedded to the God of War, 
So all-complacent 'neath despotic rule, 
So prone to look to " High Authority " 
For that which they should seek within the soul — 
Could hold the ideals which they loud' professed 
And be, indeed, as great in mind and thought 
As they would have the world believe they were. 
Yet — noting their advance in chemistry 
And in the many other arts of peace — 
Giving just heed to this their common love 
[21] 



Of music and the pretty fairy tales 

In which, 'bove others, they so much excel — 

All had at last, indeed, come to believe 

That they were much maligned — that all was 

well — 
And that the error lay within ourselves 
In that we could not grasp, or e'en perceive, 
The lessons which these traits themselves should 

tell! 

But when, by them, the war was forced to head 
'Gainst a weak people who would grant but all. 
And through a neutral state their armies led 
With crimes which would a shuddering world ap- 
pal. 
We could not but believe that — 'neath the mask. 
Beneath the learning and professed good-will — 
They had returned to their accustomed task — 
That brute and savage lurked within them still ! 
But even then we doubted, even then 
We questioned this, the evidence of sight, — 
Refused to think that such a race of men 
Could be, indeed, so blinded to the Right ; 
And so we searched for pretext, or excuse, 
To justify this mighty use of force 
That 'pon a peaceful world had been let loose 
To run its bloody, suicidal course. 
And, as we searched and tried to justify 
This brother nation of a common race. 
The word was spoke' which did, indeed, defy 
All higher thought and cast within its face 
[22] 



The brutal insult, surreptitious lie 

Which all the blood that's spilled cannot efface, 

And which all future ages must decry ! 

Not only he who spake, but they who heard 

And, hearing, coincided in the word 

And with the spirit of it did comply 

Are, too, foresworn and branded with the lie! 

The lie, indeed, that will forever stain 

A nation's conscience, heart and soul and brain - 

A lie which all the world may plainly see — 

A lie to self and to humanity ! 

Thus was the damning evidence secured ! 
Thus they our lingering doubts did e'en allay — 
Those doubts by charity of thought allured — 
Thus, self-convicted, do they stand today ! 

'Tis hard to think that in four little words — 
But thirteen little letters, all in all — 
There could be compassed such a charge as this. 
Such overwhelming evidence of truth 
And such conviction that the world at large 
Can have no doubt — howe'er it cherish ruth — 
Of this the final justice of the charge! 
But thirteen little letters serve to break 
A nation's honor, ripping from its face 
That false mask of sincerity with which 
It strove to hide its deep, besotted dreams — 
Its cold yet bloody Machiavellian plan 
To throw its tentacles o'er all the earth ! 
But four short words disclose unto the world 
[23] 



The deep depravity of mind and brain, 

The base perversion of the higher thought, 

The prostitution of the soul itself 

To Might and Force — to these, and these alone ! 

" A Scrap of Paper ! " God ! the words them- 
selves 
But rot and stink with a consuming stench 
And ope' wide vistas of sepulchral vaults 
Where decomposing carcasses repose — 
The rotting bodies of those higher aims. 
Those slow advances oft' so hardly won 
Which were the crowning glory of the world, 
And which, before, we were disposed to grant, 
In full vitality and strength of life. 
To this the race which, now, we see has slain 
These the true children of the heart and brain ! 
How little count the wealth and treasure lost, — 
The million bodies strewn upon the field — 
If, in return for this initial cost, 
'Twill offer to the soul a higher yield! 

And this result, in truth, will surely come 
To those who wage the battle, stab and slay 
That, through this means, they may at last im- 
press 
Upon her mind the evil of her way ! 

But what of her whose dead mount ever high 
And higher still upon the field of war, 
But yet whose rotting carcasses would seem 
[24] 



A small thing, crude and insignificant, 
Compared with these, the spirit and the truth — 
The justice and integrity of mind — 
Which, dead within and decomposing there, 
A horrid, gruesome spectacle unroll — 
Loathsome decay that vitiates the air 
And poisons and contaminates the soul? 

God grant that, ere too late, she yet may turn 
From this her way — may ope' her eyes and see 
That what she clasps 'twere better she should 

spurn 
Or sink still deeper in depravity ! — 
May see that " Scraps of Paper " are, indeed, 
The outward symbols of the thing within. 
Which, if not prostituted to base greed, 
Will raise us up and show how we may win 
Yet ever higher ground — the only goal 
Of the eternal and aspiring soul ! 

October, 1916. 



[25] 



THE LUSITANIA CRIME 

The Lusitania, crowded to the rail 

With men and women, children, babes in arm. 

Loosed her last line and, down the stream, set sail 

Towards ocean depths, nor seemed to feel alarm 

At muttered warnings, deep within the throat 

Of alien residents, but seemed to scorn 

The thought that she, the queen of all afloat. 

Manned by the choicest pick of brain and brawn, 

Could, in her pride of strength, meet any harm. 

And they upon her decks — as they ashore — 

Thought that the muttered threat was some o'er- 

flow 
Of 'vengeful hate, which, while they did deplore 
That it was thus allowed to breed and grow, 
Such an ignoble crop as this to reap, 
Looked not upon the threat with gravity. 
Or deemed there lived a people that would steep 
Their hearts and souls in such depravity. 
For e'en the savage we had thought had grown 
To higher standards of the heart and mind. 
And fancy flight of thought had never flown 
So far afield as to permit us find 
In this, a people who had done their part, 
Or so it seemed, towards true advancement's goal. 
Such deep depravity of mind and heart — 
Such vile and base perversion of the soul ! 
And so, full to the guards with human freight. 
Upon her last and final trip she sailed — 
A rich and bounteous harvest for that hate 

[26] 



Which lay in wait and which, if dreamed, had 

quailed 
Full many a heart, but which a kindly fate 
Had from their minds compassionately veiled. 
And woman, maid and infant at the breast, 
Lulled by a sense of false security, 
Lived out their daily lives and went to rest. 
Nor dreamed that such a thing as this could be. 

But, lurking in the shadows of the deep. 
Like some assassin of an early day, 
The skulking submarine its watch did keep 
For this its thoughtless, quite defenseless pre}^. 
And, striking from behind and in the gloom. 
Without a word of warning, gave the thrust 
That hastened, all unthinking, to their doom 
Those thoughtless souls who had but placed their 

trust 
In higher concepts of the heart and mind, 
And who had not insulted by the thought 
A people they were wont to think refined. 
Nor deemed they could to depths so base be 

brought. 

May Man's eternal curse fall on the brain — 
As on the prompt and over-willing hand — 
That so conceived and smeared with such a stain 
Itself and him who followed the command — 
With such a blood-mark that, fore'er, 'twill cry 
From deepest ocean depths to Heaven above 
And register, within the courts on high, 

[27] 



A protest that the gods themselves would move! 

'Tis hard to think that any human mind 

Could give it birth, that any human heart 

Could, in mere human sympathy, but find 

It possible to take, itself, a part 

In such perversion of the law of man 

And prostitution of the Law of God 

That 'pon a people will impress its ban 

When all now living lie beneath the sod ! 

In time, from war's red, devastating hand 

They will recover, but the blot thus set 

'Pon their escutcheon will, for ages, stand, 

And centuries of time will not forget ! 

Thus, to their children's children they bequeath, 

Not pride and virtue won at mighty cost, 

But something soul-defiling, with a wreath 

For faith abused — a nation's honor lost ! 

A murderer's legacy that will endure 

While time shall last, or memory remain, — 

A moral blemish, vile, corrupt, impure, — 

A people branded w ith the mark of Cain ! 

How much the better is the lot of those — 
The women and the children, coldly slain, — 
Who, sinking to their death, again but rose 
To live in memory — free from such stain ! 
For Nature's laws, though firm, are ever just, 
And he whose frenzied fury prompts him slay 
The innocent, the trusting, or the weak. 
Will reap the harvest of his bloody lust 
And come at last, himself, to rue the day 
[28] 



He e'er was born, such crime as this, to wreak ! 
And each pale corpse that floats upon the wave — 
Each blood-stained, curl-bedraggled infant's 

face — 
Shall call to Heaven above, in pity's name. 
To dig still deeper this the nation's grave 
That buried thus its honor in disgrace, 
And decked its tomb with dismal wreaths of 

shame ! 

October, 1916. 



[29] 



NATIONALISM OR INDIVIDUALISM? 

(Written after reading Professor Hugo Miinsterberg's 
plea for " Nationalism " as opposed to " Individualism," 
accompanied by his prediction that German Kultur must 
dominate the earth.) 

Within the muddy current of the swirl 

Of doubts and fears and new perplexities — 

Of precedents o'erthrown and plans displaced — 

In which the world at large has been engulfed 

By this most huge and all-devouring war, 

We hear, on all sides, generalities 

Of what must follow when — the carnage past — 

The world returns to normal purposes, 

And peace and quietude prevail at last. 

Some think that competition, ever rife. 
Will 'pon the earth but take a firmer hold. 
And 'twixt its strangling fingers squeeze the life 
By its aggressive pressure, firm and bold, 
And, e'en before War's blood-stained hands are 

cold. 
Will rise again in keen commercial strife. 
And these would seem to think that, 'neath the 

weight 
Of this its pressure, plan must follow plan 
Till all the earth be stirred again with hate 
That ever simmers in the heart of Man. 
And some whose lineage is of Teuton strain. 
Or having Teuton minds, if not its birth. 
Profess to think that all must be in vain 
If Kultur fail to dominate the earth. 
[30] 



" Nationalism ! " is their battle cry — 

The panacea of life's earthly woe — 

And, loud and stridently, they do defy 

Those, unconvinced, who but attempt to show 

That Individuality should be 

The goal towards which humanity should trace 

Its faltering steps, which — reached — will set 

Man free 
And bring him, in the end, to his own place ! 
To these the individual is but 
An atom in the composition of 
The mighty wheel of State, which doth revolve 

Without his further help doth crush or cut 

Beyond his puny power to block or stay, 

Whose duty is but to supply the strength 

With which it moves — to think not, but obey ! 

This — his ideal of the higher life ! 

This — his conception of the migthy plan. 

The individuality of strife — 

Which fashions reasoning, self-conscious Man ! 

But, as the error grew within his mind 

E'en as he drew the milk from out the breast 

'Pon which in childhood's earliest days he lay, 

Is it, indeed, so strange that now we find 

Him advocating with such earnest zest 

A course that, if but followed, must betray 

His better self, his higher thought and aims, 

His true advancement towards the final goal, 

And, by discarding all the moral claims, 

Lead to annihilation of the soul? 

For his conception is not of the brain, 

[31:1 



But rather one of habit and of blood, 

And, where the first would guide, direct, restrain, 

The other breaks all bounds and, in the flood 

Of loosened passions, carries in its course 

The finer instincts of the mind and soul 

And, feeling thus its weakness, grants to force — 

Conceived as State — unlimited control. 

But, though adult in many ways, such minds 

Have still a childish tendency of thought 

And, as Authority in childhood binds, 

So these, the childish minds, have ever sought 

To prove that individuality 

Is, in itself, a weakness in disguise. 

And that above it nationality 

Must, in its majesty, forever rise! 

And this perverted logic is the clue 

To all that strange perversity of mind — 

To all that overweening confidence — 

Which, when perceived, they must most sadly rue. 

And rue still more when, in the end, they find 

What disillusion is its recompense ! 

But others — though they, too, fight in the van 
For their own breed of nationality — 
Have clearer thought and insight and still can 
Perceive that, 'bove it all, Morality 
Must ever be the high, controlling power, 
As well as motive force that drives Man on 
To ever higher points and still will shower, 
Upon his path, new standards to be won. 
And as Morality is naught, indeed, 
[32] 



Save the harmonic and established 

Relation which the individual 

Sustains to Nature's true Constructive Law, 

'Tis possible for each, within himself. 

To solve the problem — put it to the test — 

And, if it doth comply with these demands. 

Disclose which of two ways would seem the best. 

And to do this he needs to look to none 

But his own soul, directed by the mind, 

For there the true solution to be won 

He will himself, all unassisted, find ! 

True individuality will show 

A fuller obligation to the State 

To which attached — the which, with him, must 

grow 
To high and higher planes ordained by Fate. 
'Twill cause him to take arms in her defence 
By his own choice — not driven to the fight — 
And deem, for this, his only recompense 
The firm conviction that he stands for Right ! 
'Twill make him see that he must ever stand 
For weakness, 'gainst the bold, aggressive strong, 
Nor cause him to give ear to the demand 
So often urged — " My country, right or wrong ! " 
For is there not a higher moral law 
Than that of country — - is there not an aim 
That supersedes mere nationality — 
To which all lands on earth may lay just claim? — 
The aim for common justice — land 'gainst land, 
As we profess to grant it, man 'gainst man — 
If we obey Morality's command 
[33] 



And act in unison with Nature's plan ! 

But, here again, the atavistic strain, 

So oft' apparent in our thought and act, 

Leaves its impression on the heart and brain 

And, in our mode of thinking, would react 

'Pon forward progress — pointing to an age. 

Now lost within the shadow-mists of time. 

When man, against his neighbor, did but wage 

Incessant war — nor had begun to climb 

His slow, laborious way to higher thought — 

To true conceptions of the heart and soul — 

Nor had, indeed, the first faint glimmer caught 

Of true Morality — the final goal ! 

And, with his hand forever turned upon 

His neighbor's peace, he felt he must rely 

Upon united action of the tribe, 

And here was born the ancient battle-cry — : 

From it, in turn, the patriotic song — 

" As one we stand ! My country, right or 

wrong ! " 
With which he would his enemies defy ! 
And thus we see that such unthinking rage 
Has its conception in the primal " Clan," 
Far down the dim and shadowy paths of age — 
Back in the early infancy of Man. 

But Man has now outgrown such childish ways — 
Has left behind such primitive desire 
As ruled him in the crude and early days — 
And should, indeed, to something more aspire — 
To something which his heart and soul and mind, 
[34] 



His intuition and his higher thought, 

Whisper within his soul that he may find 

If but with effort diligently sought. 

But seek he must — each one with his own brain 

Nor let composite nationality 

Retard his effort, or attempt restrain. 

Or hamper individuality. 

Thus, and thus only, can he throw his weight 

Into the balance on the proper side — 

Thus, and thus only, make indeed of State 

An object for his confidence and pride! 

For, if we have outgrown the foolish lie 

Of " Right Divine," we cannot fail to see 

That, to a perfect State, we must apply 

Each soul's proportion of divinity ! 

And this divinity we must enhance 

By exercise of single heart and brain — 

Nor leave to State, nor yet, indeed, to chance 

The true fulfillment that we may attain 

If — recognizing obligation's sway 

And guided by a true morality — 

Each single unit doth pursue its way 

Towards higher individuality ! 

October, 1916. 



[35] 



" DIVINE RIGHT " 

E'en in this age when Man has near' outgrown 
The cruder forms of superstitious thought 
Which o'er his path of infancy had thrown 
Its dark and dismal shadow, often fraught 
With much of pain and suffering for him, 
Some still would try to hold the human mind 
To some outgrown belief, now faint and dim, 
That, with its help, they might contrive to bind 
Man's strength to their desire for pride or 

place — 
For wealth, for ease, authority, or power — 
And make their brothers of the human race 
Before their rude assumption cringe and cower. 
And so they prattle of a " Right Divine " — 
Those earthly monarchs by reaction stirred — 
Nor seem to see they thereby undermine 
Their true position and the rights conferred 
'Pon them by their companions of the flesh 
Who at their feet so many honors cast, 
Yet whose enfranchised thought they would enmesh 
In such crude superstitions of the past ! 
And, as they lord it o'er their fellow man. 
In blasphemous effrontery they speak 
Of this or that divine-conceived plan 
And, as they do, their very words but reek 
With such a stench of petty, foolish pride — 
With such supreme impertinence in-bred — 
That those at first inclined but to deride 
Are moved to loathsome nausea instead. 
[36] 



They prattle of the " Mighty God of Wars," 

" The God of Battle " and the " God of Might "— 

Nor seem to think a God of Moral Laws 

May rule instead — a mighty God of Right ! 

And as they call His benediction 'pon 

Their anns and cause — perchance for power or 

pelf — 
While all the higher moral laws they shun, 
They prostitute the name of God itself ! 
But, with the name of God forever on 
Their base, perverted lips, they but attempt 
To rule their kind — these, so-called " royal- 
born " 
Who, deep within, must view but with contempt 
Their own proud boast if they, indeed, possess 
A human brain at all with which to think. 
Or — if believing this their claim — confess 
The depths to which perverted mind may sink ! 
Divine? Perchance! as all men are divine! 
With such a portion of divinity 
As each can claim, can work and can refine 
To some approach to true Infinity ! 
But this is personal in every case, 
Nor keeps the channel of ancestral strain — 
A common gift to all the human race 
Which each must prove his power to retain — 
A latent force in every human heart — 
A spark potential in each living soul 
That, 'neath Constructive Law, would do its part 
To strive a little further towards the goal ! 
How many ages yet before we turn 
[37] 



'Pon such cheap arrogance and petty pride — 

How many ages yet before we learn 

That true divinity must coincide 

With thought and act and — ratlier than to kneel 

In meek subjection to such vanity — 

Cast it aside and crush beneath the heel 

In the sure progress of humanity? 

October, 1916. 



[38] 



THE INVISIBLE ARMY 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

How the silent footsteps fall ! 

If the listening ear could the sound but hear 

How its volume would appal ! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
'Tis the souls of the slain in war 
Who rendered life in the bloody strife 
For such light as they dimly saw ! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

How the endless column grows ! 

How the ranks fill up as the proffered cup 

Drains life of its joys and woes! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
How many fought true and clean? 
How many struck, in the bloody ruck, 
The blow that was base and mean? 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
How many battled for Right? 
How many died in aggressive pride 
As they fought for the God of Might? 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
How many impelled by lust — 
The lust of power for a fleeting hour — 
At the cost of the weak, or just! 
[39] 



Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
How many can say : *' 'Tis well ! " ? 
How many more must the act deplore 
In the nethermost depths of hell? 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

How many by Spirit led? 

How many turned on the Spirit — spurned? 

And slew their souls instead? 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

What a harvest, beyond compare, 

Of the shining grain, without blight or stain, 

But mixed with the weed and tare ! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
Stilled heart and silenced breath ! 
Each takes his stand in the motley band 
Of this harvest-home of death ! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

No earthly power so strong 

As to take command, or to lend a hand, 

'Gainst Right in its fight with Wrong! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
Each soul with its weight of blame — 
Each one with its load that must ever goad 
Where it fought 'gainst its conscience' claim ! 



[40] 



Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 

How the legions hurry on, 

As they strain their eyes to the distant prize 

That is lost, or nobly won ! 

Tramp ! tramp ! tramp ! 
Each bound for the self-same goal, 
Where each will stand as his deeds command 
In the judgment of the soul ! 

November, 1916. 



[41] 



ANTICHRIST 

Love, truth and peace ; good-will on earth to men ; 
Justice and faith ; sincerity and right ; 
Help for the helpless, succor for the weak ; 
Protection for the poor 'gainst power and 

might — 
These were the teachings that were brought to 

earth 
By him who in a lowly manger lay ; 
These were the truths he gave a fuller birth — 
The truths whose light illum'ed the proper way 
That should, thereafter, by all men be trod — 
The obligation that 'pon all he lay — 
This was the message of the Man of God ! 

But now we see another, clothed in might, 
Who holds within the hollow of his hand 
A mighty race, the which he doth command 
To blind their eyes to justice, truth and right 
And, in insensate fury, tear apart 
And drown beneath the carnage of foul fight 
All these the higher instincts of the heart. 
He bids them shatter treaties duly sworn 
By solemn vow, and, but to hide the shame 
That in his heart forever must be borne, 
He strives by lies to slander and defame 
E'en those despoiled by his consuming lust 
For power and might, that he, thereby, may wean 
All sympathy from those who put their trust 
Upon an honor that had never been. 
[42] 



And — not content with slaying women, babes — 

In cynical contempt of right and law 

Of God and man, he blasphemously raves, 

While reeking with the fetid stench of war, 

Of some high purpose that he claims his own — 

Some mighty mission granted from on high. 

That is revealed to him and him alone — 

Which orders that beneath his rule should lie 

And bow to his o'ermastering control 

All other peoples who the claim defy 

And spura with deepest loathing of the soul. 

To show his right to guide the souls of men 
He piles foul ignominies on those ta'en 
In honest fight and, in detention pen, 
Permits the spread of scourges that would stain 
The crude, barbaric heart of bestial Hun, 
Or some marauding tribe of savage birth. 
And counts it naught if, in return, is won 
The power to stamp his will upon the earth. 
And so, as though to prove his monstrous claim. 
He instigates the Turk to burn and slay. 
To ravish women, persecute and maim 
The helpless babes that 'pon their bosoms lay. 
Thus doth the earth run red with streams of blood 
From these, the helpless weak, so fouU}'^ slain, 
The crimson stains of whose ensanguined flood 
The hand of Time itself will strive in vain 
To wipe from out the memory of man, 
Or sponge from off the dastard's bloody soul. 
Whose children's children still must bear the ban 
[43] 



And, through the coming ages, pay the toll 
While Time in its unending course shall roll ! 

If the full page of history we scan, 

Can we find such antithesis as here 

Between the Prince of Peace — the Son of Man — 

And this the " War God " that doth foully leer 

Upon the earth with cold and blood-shot eyes — 

With crimsoned sabre clasped in mailed fist — 

Who laughs to scorn the supplicating cries, 

And breathes but vengeance 'pon those who resist ? 

The world could better bear the bloody crime 

And from his blackened soul withhold some blame 

If his foul lips would cease but to begrime 

By constant use the other, sacred name, 

Which grows more pure and bright with passing 

time, 
But which his tongue but prostitutes in shame ! 

Thus antichrist of Christ doth ever speak ; 
Doth prate of justice, truth and higher law; 
Though, while he speaks, his bloody hands but 

reek 
With crimes that fill a shuddering world with 

awe — 
With sins so base that reason scarce can grasp 
The full intent that evidence would prove — 
And who attempts to mold within his clasp 
To his own use — e'en Christ, the Man of Love ! 
November, 1916. 

[44] 



SMITTEN FLANDERS 

Bending 'neath the bondsman's burden; 
Smarting from oppressor's goad ; 
Naught but faith and hope the guerdon 
That can help to ease the load ; 
Naught but present resignation 
As a cloak wherewith to drape 
Thy concealed determination 
To avenge the dastard's rape ! 

As the wolves in hordes descending 
On thy little, valiant band, 
Back to back they stood defending 
This their honor and their land; 
Paid the price by Fate demanded — 
Paid not part, indeed, but whole; 
Died the death, but died unbranded 
With dishonor of the soul ! 

Gentle Flanders, crushed and bleeding 
'Neath the base oppressor's heel ; 
Having nothing — all things needing — 
Yet stands firm nor seems to reel 
As each brutal blow descending 
Lacerates thy quivering form — 
Firm in spirit, never bending, 
Still less breaking 'neath the storm ! 

Thy sweet country mutilated — 
Gentle rivers running red — 
[45] 



Thou didst bear while crime thus sated 
All its blood-lust on thy head ; 
Victim of a crude ambition, 
Thou must suffer still and bleed 
Wl^le the brute without contrition 
Sates his soul-defiling greed ! 

Homes and cities devastated ; 
Women raped and children maimed ; 
Thy cathedrals desecrated ; 
For thy crucifixion blamed ; 
Faith perverted ; truth distorted ; 
Prostituted, all the laws ; 
Now thy sons in chains deported 
To assist the traitor's cause ! 

Herded, driven, e*en as cattle 
To the bloody abattoir ; 
E'en denied the gage of battle — 
Death itself in holy war ! 
Thou must linger still and suffer 
For the cause thou dost defend. 
Acting as the traitor's buffer 
To postpone his coming end ! 

Families are torn and riven ; 
Fathers from their children ta'en ; 
Husband into bondage driven, 
Leaving wife on bed of pain ; 
No historic page e'er written 
In the annals of all time 
[46] 



Shows a land more basely smitten 
With a plethora of crime ! 

Keep thy courage, little nation, 
Though the way seem hard and long! 
In the final revelation 
Thou wilt see that to the strong 
Of the spirit much is granted 
That's denied aggressive might — 
That they ever win who planted 
First the standard of the Right ! 

O'er the earth all eyes are turning 
To thy proud and valiant stand ! 
In all countries hearts are burning 
For thy desecrated land ! 
Souls are filled with admiration. 
Full to overflow with pride 
For the little, dauntless nation 
That, for honor, bled and died ! 
November, 1916. 



[47] 



FRANCIS JOSEPH 

Stiff, rigid in the panoply of death, 

Lies the unhallowed corpse of him whose life 

Of many years was lived midst constant strife 

For selfish gain, whose every conscious breath 

But breathed reaction, stifling in the heart 

Of those, his people, liberties they sought 

Which were not his to grant, but formed a part 

Of this the heritage their birthright brought. 

An emperor of women, song and wine; 

A politician keen, astute and wise; 

An earthly monarch prating Right Divine, 

But lacking the divinity to rise 

Above his own degenerative line — 

Above the selfish instincts of his birth. 

Above a petty prejudice of mind 

That thought that he and all those of his kind 

Were granted right to dominate the earth — 

To juggle justice, liberty and life; 

To handle men as petty pawns of play ; 

Upon whose word hung peace or bloody strife ; 

Whose only object was to have his way 

And still retain his undisputed sway ! 

And now he lies upon his earthly bier. 
Bedecked in the caparisons of state, 
A morsel for the worm now drawing near. 
Proud flesh for which corruption will not wait, 
A thing pathetic, desolate and drear — 
Itself the cheap and petty pawn of Fate ! 
[48] 



How many were the chances he ignored ; 

How great the opportunities let slip ; 

How full of service to mankind was stored 

The cup he dashed when offered to the lip ! 

So let him go ! 'Tis well that he is gone ! 

'Twere better still to think he were the last 

Of these self-styled " divine," these " royal 

born " — 
The crude survivals of an age now past ! 
Perchance where now he dwells he sees that might, 
O'erweening pride and petty, selfish strife 
But count for naught — that Justice and the 

Right 
Disclose the true criterion of life ! 
And he who ruled perhaps may come to be 
The serving slave of those who here did cower 
Beneath his rule, and thereby come to see 
That Service only is the key to power — 
A power inherent in no royal line, 
The single power consistent with the plan 
Of Nature's scheme — the only Right Divine 
That proves the true divinity in man ! 

November, 1916. 



[49] 



THE NEW " KINGDOM OF POLAND » 

A KINGDOM new-created by decree 

Of shrewd, aggressive arrogance and lust — 

Created only that it, too, may be 

Used as another tool wherewith to thrust 

Beneath the armor of a worthy foe — 

The work of those forced to extremest length 

Who strive by methods dastardly and low 

To gain a point unequal to their strength! 

A kingdom, but, forsooth, without a king; 
Without a people free to make their choice; 
A seeming gift that hides a vicious sting — 
A people " freed," but lacking power or voice ! 

Freedom in name, but in naught else indeed ; 
Freedom to bend their necks beneath the yoke 
And serve the purpose of devouring greed, 
Which uses freedom's mask but as a cloak 
Wherewith to hide from a disgusted world. 
And blind the eyes by its fair, spotless name, 
The crimes unspeakable it has unfurled 
With this the striped banner of its shame ! 

'Tis fitting that within its flag appears 

The sombre black, that color dark and drear 

That typifies its aim — the aim that sears 

The souls of those who work through force and 

fear! 
November, 1916. 

[50] 



THE PATRIOTIC HYMN 

Why is it that in almost every land — 

No matter what its true enlightenment, 

Its state of progress and development, 

Its peaceful purpose, or pacific stand — 

The nation's hymn, its patriotic song, 

Forever brandishes the mailed hand. 

Forever prates of power and command. 

Sings of its righteousness — its neighbor's 

wrong — 
Claiming for earth's advance the major part. 
Holding aloft the banner of the strong 
And, by so doing, helping to prolong 
This latent instinct of the human heart? 

E'en in those lands where liberty is sung. 
Where freedom is the burden of the lay. 
How oft' the chanted word but runs astray ; 
How oft' the heart inflamed, the passions wrung 
By frequent reference to tyrant's rod 
'Neath which a former generation stung. 
To whose remembrance we have ever clung — 
Whose flagging recollection we must prod 
To life in each new generation's mind 
By songs of blood-besprinkled hearth and sod — 
Prayers to some strange anthropomorphic god 
Whose power to us alone we strive to bind ! 

One bravely claims his navy rules the wave ; 
Another sings that over all the world 
[51] 



His is the banner that must be unfurled — 

To His all nations bend the knee as slave ! 

'Tis like the chanting of the tribal clan 

Who of their petty strength were wont to rave, 

Who ever sang the virtues of their brave 

In bloody combat — prehistoric man 

Who had but faint conception of the soul, 

Still fainter inkling of eternal plan. 

Or moral courage that would place a ban 

'Pon all that checks the progress towards the goal ! 

Why is it that we still must firmly bind 
Our aspirations to a distant past — 
To crude conceptions that are now outcast 
By every strong and virile human mind? 
Why is it that our patriotic lays 
Continue so unceasingly to grind 
These outlived crudities, nor seem to find 
A higher theme than self-conceit and praise? 
Has ne'er a loftier purpose been revealed. 
Or are we still so bound to ancient ways 
That, even now, our eyes we cannot raise 
Above the carnage of the trodden field? 

Should not our patriotic hymns, instead, 
Point to some moral victory we've gained — 
The higher altitudes to be attained 
If by the light of Conscious Reason led? 
Should not they point to weaknesses outgrown 
And, by so doing, thus attempt to shed 
True optimism on the way ahead 
[52] 



By showing moral obstacles o'erthrown? 

Thus will the steady progress to the goal, 

By standards of progressing thought, be shown, 

And higher aspirations, duly sown, 

Bring forth a fitting harvest of the soul ! 

December, 1916. 



[53] 



THE GERMAN PEACE PROPOSAL 

For thirty months the world has been at war, 

In a mad contest the enlightened ones 

Among the nations strove with might and main 

To turn, avert, e'en to the very hour 

That steel clashed steel, that guns with thunder 

roared. 
That anger, hate and venom were unloosed 
O'er all the earth ; the hour when 'gan to flow 
That steady crimson stream of human blood 
That ever to a fuller tide doth grow 
And drowns the land 'neath its ensanguined flood. 

For thirty months the countries of the world 
Have drawn their distant sons from east and west, 
From north and south, and 'pon a common field 
Have their embattled legions fiercely hurled 
And rendered up their bravest and their best 
Rather than see the common ideal yield 
Before besotted dreams of selfish lust. 
Before crude arrogance and haughty pride. 
Before the blood-besmeared God of Might 
Who with a crafty treachery would thrust 
Beneath the guard, humanity o'erride, 
And bring to naught the thing we know as Right. 

And now when the first brunt has been withstood 
By those attacked — those all too unprepared, 
But who have ta'en their punishment therefor — 
The arch aggressor, with his puppets, would 
[54] 



Forsooth grant peace, and blatantly has dared 
To offer to withhold his dogs of war 
If he — God save the mark ! — be unassailed, 
As in the past, by some imagined foe ; 
Be granted power to expand and grow ; 
And that the world admit that it has failed 
To check his arrogant, aggressive might 
Sporting the mask of true, defensive Right ! 

" Our aim is never to annihilate! " 

Thus speaks the tongue that loosed the turbid 

flood, 
And whose devouring lust e'en now would sate 
Its quenchless thirst in little Belgium's blood ! 
The tongue that orders human slavery 
P^or conquered French, for Belgian and for Pole — 
Which speaks the words of lying knavery 
That show the instincts of its heart and soul ! 
The tongue that chants the dismal " hymn of 

hate," 
And, showing its crude animosity 
Towards all who disagree, attempts to prate 
Beneath the guise of generosity ! 

List to him yet again ! " I have," he says, 
" But been obliged to take up arms that I 
The cause of justice and of liberty — 
The right to live in quietude and peace — 
May, 'gainst a cruel and envious world, defend ! " 
Thus speaks the man, " the chosen man of God," 
The man of " Right Divine " whose word did steel 
[55] 



The heart of his base ally to attack 
A little nation — ravish, burn and sack, 
And crush beneath its proud, aggressive heel 
A people's life and liberty — whose nod 
Did loose his hordes upon another land 
Which he had pledged his honor to protect. 
Whose only crime was that it did reject 
The brutal insult and but took its stand 
Upon its plighted word, its honor's name — 
A weak, but proud and valiant, little band 
Who rise above his power to defame. 
Who through the ages will respect command 
When he lies buried in the depths of shame ! 

While bragging of the prowess of his arm 
With cheap effrontery that would disgrace 
Some savage chieftain puffed with petty pride, 
He voices disingenuous alarm 
Of what may come if war, allowed to trace 
Its common course, should drown within its tide 
The many gains so slow and dearly bought — 
The store of blood and treasure yet retained — 
Which through the ages man has ever sought 
And which, till now, he thought in truth was 
gained. 

And so, to shift responsibility 
Upon some other shoulders than his own. 
He strives with halting plausibility 
To show how for his sins they may atone 
By granting due concession to his might, 
[56] 



As though the sins his soul must ever bear 

Can e'er be shifted in the common sight 

Or be aught else than crime without compare ! 

Thus with tergiversation, subterfuge, 

With crude evasion and with lying word, 

Doth Schrecklichkeit attempt to shift the huge, 

Perverted moral burden thus incurred. 

And, with a haughty arrogance of mien, 

The insult to all thinking minds is thrown. 

Which thinly veils a purpose clearly seen 

And which an outraged world must needs disowTi ! 

" Seized with deep pity in the face of all 

The misery unspeakable 'neath which 

Humanity at present dumbly bends," 

He will, forsooth, " grant peace unto the world " 

If but they will admit his august sway. 

Put up their swords, tear down the flags unfurled. 

And to him in the future grant a way 

For his obsession of controlling force. 

Of rude, aggressive arrogance and might 

That o'er all human laws would take its course 

As o'er that law divine — the law of Right ! 

'Tis strange the pity that he now would claim. 
With such an unctuousness of saddened heart. 
Had not been felt ere he had made his aim 
Dismemberment of bleeding part from part 
In those small countries he has overrun. 
Whose faithful sons to bondage he has led — 
Ere he, for this the land and treasure won, 
[57] 



Had mortgaged faith and honor m their stead! 
Grant peace unto the world? God grant instead 
War, bloody war, with all it holds in store — 
With every stream and river running red, 
With earth encrimsoned from its bath of gore; 
With all the pain and suffering entailed, 
War's bitter cup of wormwood mixed with gall — 
Which, otherwise, had naught indeed availed 
If this should be the ending to it all ! 
Better that earth should stifle in its blood, 
And sink in shapeless mass beneath the grime. 
Than yield free course to this devouring flood, 
And thus grant consecration to its crime! 

December, 1916. 



[58] 



A PROTEST 

"If the civilized world of the twentieth century is willing 
to stand silent and see these things done, in cumulative 
progression, in violation of the laws of humanity and of 
nations, then the civilization of the twentieth century is 
worse than the savagery of the Romans." — (Extract from 
a speech by the Hon. Elihu Root, in protest against the 
German deportations of Belgian civilians. New York, De- 
cember 15, 1916.) 

With what inspiring sound such words as these 
Ring in the ears of all who cherish, deep 
Within their hearts, the thought of Liberty ! 
What an appeal they make to mind and soul ! 
How must they stir within the consciences 
Of those who think that wrongs not done to us 
Should, therefore, be no matter of concern ! 
" Am I my brother's keeper? " these would ask, 
" Why stir ourselves from our accustomed course 
And take a hand in other countries' strife? " 
With words like these they would evade the task 
And, by so doing, bow to brutal force 
And cede the primal verities of life ! 
We are our brother's keeper as of old, 
And as throughout the ages we must be 
Whene'er we hear our conscience stir and call ; 
And more than ever if, as now, he hold 
Aloft the banner of the just and free 
And, with his blood, defends it from the thrall 
Of those who would but trample in the dust 
And make of human liberty a tool 
With which, 'gainst all the laws, to force their 
way — 

[59] 



Moved by a brutal, all-consuming lust 
That orders all to bow unto its rule 
And bend the knee to its benighted sway ! 
Had we no selfish interest could we 
Resist the call and still be known as men 
And not as slaves to indolence and greed ? 
What is our blindness that we fail to see 
Our brother's cause is truly ours, and when 
Will we at last the common warning heed? 
Must we ourselves be trampled 'neath the heel, 
Be burned and ravished by despoiling hand 
And driven in the slave gang of the foe 
Ere we can bring ourselves our hearts to steel, 
And o'er our thoughtless folly take command — 
Or drain to lowest dregs the cup of woe? 
Can we not read the writing on the wall — 
Can we not see, before it be too late, 
The precipice 'pon which our path doth lie? 
Doth present pride predict the coming fall 
Which for the thoughtless ever lies in wait — 
Must we, to learn to live, first learn to die? 
Thus, and no other, it indeed would seem ! — 
A sad, pathetic state of moral health — 
Self-centred, thoughtless, self-deluded, vain ; 
Somnambulists that wander in a dream, 
Seeking alone the will-o'-wisp of wealth 
And blinded to all higher forms of gain ! 
Can those awake but make themselves be heard 
In time to save the little, valiant race 
Now ta'en as slaves to the despoiler's land? — 
Whose sufferings all Imman hearts have stirred 
[60] 



Who, all defenseless, now alone must face 
And bear the brutal blow of mailed hand. 
If we fail now to heed their helpless cry 
For succor in their hour of direst need, 
Which rings in piteous accents 'round the earth, 
Then God do so with us when we shall lie 
Beneath the despot's heel and vainly plead 
For rights that are inherent with our birth ! 
And such a course as this will surely bring 
But one result — the nations of the world 
Will steel their hearts to this our own distress. 
And in our teeth our false position fling 
The while they note, with scornful lip upcurled. 
The moral weakness that our acts confess. 
Is this to be the fate in time to come 
Of those who prated human liberty ? 
Is this to be this nation's final goal — 
The net result, the balance of the sum, 
The profit of pusillanimity 
That dared not back the whisper of the soul.^ 
It cannot be ! But yet, why do we lag 
While days and weeks slip by with little done 
To make a full impression 'pon the foe 
That their opponents into bondage drag 
And, 'gainst all ideals we had thought were won. 
Fill to repletion this their cup of woe? 
Awake, my country ! Slumber not while now 
The evil genius walks upon the earth 
And wreaks his vengeance 'pon the helpless weak ! 
Arise ! Gird up thy loins and make thy vow — 
Look back unto the time of thine own birth 
[61] 



When thou a helping hand did'st also seek — 
And swear to rest not till the wrong now done 
Shall, by thy help if need be, be restrained — 
By peaceful methods, or by flag unfurled, — 
For not till then have we indeed begun 
To pay for liberty that we have gained. 
Or this our proud position in the world ! 

December, 1916. 



[62] 



THE ANSWER 

" Peace I offer as a favor, as I cast a cur a bone ; 
If thou relish not the savor, still remember I alone 
Have the right to grant such blessing through my 

armies' proved might 
Without weakness thus confessing — I who only 

stand for Right ! 

" I am victor in the battle, 'pon the sea and 'pon 
the land ! 

Those who disagree but prattle 'neath the foe- 
man's guiding hand! 

If thou grant not my contention then upon th}^ 
shoulders bear 

All the sorrow and dissension, all the weight of 
blame and care ! " 

With such words the instigator tries the issue to 
evade — 

Arch aggressor, double traitor, he who first un- 
sheathed the blade; 

Blinding still his people's vision, molding thought 
to his command — 

Covering with just derision all the people of his 
land! 

Who e'er heard a peace thus offered by the one 

who fain would cease? 
Is the olive branch thus proffered by the seeker 

of release 

[63] 



From the awful pain and sorrow like a common 

garment worn ? — 
Retribution he did borrow — yet too heavy to be 

borne ! 

Peace with words like these? No, never! Be the 
outcome what it may ! 

Words like thine can but dissever, and postpone 
the coming day 

When the dove of peace shall hover o'er a better 
era's birth — 

Striving with its wings to cover mutilated, blood- 
soaked earth. 

Peace thou mayest have in season when thy 

wrongs thou dost confess ; 
When thou comest to thy reason and, beneath the 

storm and stres-s 
Of thy thoughts and aims perverted, can perceive 

the distant goal 
And, at last, become converted to a change of 

heart and soul ! 

When the wrongs that thou hast piled 'pon a 

weak, defenseless land 
By thy people are reviled; when, at heart, thou 

take the stand 
That the crimes thou hast committed must, by 

self, be purged away — 
That thy error full admitted can, alone, the spectre 

lay! 

[64] 



When thou ceasest from the hollow worship of the 

God of Might 
And at heart decide to follow in the common way 

of Right — 
Then — and not till then — thou mayest, with a 

conscience full and free, 
Ask the boon for which thou prayest — then will 

Peace be granted thee ! 

December, 1916. 



[65] 



THE TRUE PRAYER 

" We accepted this war for an object, a worthy object, 
and the war will end when that object is attained. Under 
God, I hope it never will end until that time." — Abraham 
Lincoln, June, I864. 

Such were the words with which the man we now 

Look up to as this nation's greatest son 

Answered the oft' and loud repeated cry 

Of those who yearned for peace at any price — 

Who thought that peace but constituted all 

That was most worthy in a nation's life, 

And who denunciations down would call 

'Pon all that gained accomplishment through 

strife. 
Then, e'en as now, pacifists could but sense 
The outward indications of the laws 
That guide our lives, nor glimpsed the recom- 
pense 
Of bloody strife waged in a worthy cause. 
How impotent to murmur sighs for peace 
If that 'pon which peace rests has not been 

gained — 
How futile thus to pray that strife may cease 
With that for which it started unattained ! 
With some great human principle at stake. 
When neither side the victory has won, 
How vain an inconclusive peace to make 
And leave unfinished what is just begun! 
But such pacifists — warm of heart, if head 
Be not by reason, but emotion, led — 
See not the higher purpose to be won, 
[66] 



But only glimpse the dying and the dead. 
For what of these, cut off in youth's full bloom, 
Compared with that for which each mortal strives 
And unborn generations 'scape the doom 
Which to avert they rendered up their lives ? 
When Right takes up the battle gage of Wrong 
Why whimper " Peace ! " before the fight is done, 
When we should strive the combat to prolong 
Until conclusive victory be won? 
Are not such things beyond our power to sway — 
May not, indeed, the sanguinary strife 
But represent our Mother Nature's way 
Of working out her principles of life? 
And he who ever strives alone for peace — 
Who, for the same, would bow to ruthless force — 
Perchance may future obstacles increase 
And, all unthinking, block the higher course! 
Such must have been the thought that moved the 

man 
Whose words of wisdom once again we use — 
Which caused him to relinquish every plan 
And, 'gainst all opposition, to refuse 
To compromise by undecided fight 
With what, within his soul, he knew as Right ! 
And though a nation's pain oppressed his heart 
Near to the breaking point, he still must choose 
What wisdom told him was the better part 
If this, the higher gain, he would not lose ! 
Oh ! for a Lincoln in our midst today — 
A patriot to whom all hearts could turn. 
Whose wisdom would now indicate the way 
[67] 



Which, in our selfish folly, we would spurn ! 

For how, with honor, can we now withhold 

Support from those whose cause we deem is right 

Without permitting conscience to grow cold, 

And losing caste within all peoples' sight ? 

But if we lack the moral force to play 

The part of highest honor, still we must 

Refrain from interfering with the way 

Of those whose cause we think is right and just ! 

For they our battle now, for us, but wage. 

The which 'tis strange we cannot seem to see — 

A Holy War in which we should engage 

If we ourselves would champion Liberty ! 

And he who claims the aims of both are one. 

That Freedom represents their common cause. 

But speaks vain words of insincerity — 

Pedantic phrases, vague and finely spun, 

That take no heed of higher, truer laws 

And show the prompting of pure sophistry ! 

Such words as these belie, misrepresent 

The common thought and feeling, heart and brain, 

And place a stigma we should all resent — 

An unjust injury, a common stain ! 

If we be not prepared to make the choice 

'Twixt Might and Right, why so solicitous 

Of others' pain ? — why strive to raise our voice 

In words officious and gratuitous? 

For now the world has other things to do 

Than weigh fine phrase and academic speech, 

The while it battles for the just and true 

[68] 



And wades through streams of human blood to 

reach 
A higher ideal for the common life, 
A better understanding, fuller gain, 
For — though the goal be reached through bloody 

strife — 
This is the object it would now attain! 
And rather than to pray for incomplete 
And armed peace — naught but a breathing spell 
Before some not far distant battle call — 
Which would the higher purposes defeat, 
Why not give heed and weigh and study well 
The inner aims that underlie it all 
And — in the words of him who saw so plain 
The vital forces that but here contend 
For true advance, more worthy and sublime — 
Ask not for peace that's inconclusive, vain. 
But pray to God the war may never end 
Its raging, turbid course until that time! 

December, 1916. 



[69] 



CONTRADISTINCTION 

" I regard the note of my government as constituting an 
acceptance of everytliing suggested by President Wilson in 
his note to the belligerent nations of Europe." — Count von 
Bernstorff, December 27, 1916. 

What mean mere words with Germany con- 
cerned ? 
Why strive accepted standards to apply? 
For 'tis complied with, what we thought was 

spurned, 
If but we view it with the German eye 
That sees all things through this Teutonic veil — 
This strange, perverted, self-created mist 
Which renders other thought of no avail 
To those who 'pon its fallacies insist ! 
To them the Right must ever seem the Wrong ; 
The Wrong the Right; the false, the good and 

true. 
And weakness, in the common sight, is strong 
When they so will it ; red, not red, but blue 
When they desire ; black, but a form of white ; 
And though the world at large be color-blind, 
Such basic facts are clear to any sight 
That views them with the true Teutonic mind ! 
For bad is good ; and good, indeed, is bad ; 
And " yes " not the affirmative, but " no " ; 
Sickness is health, as joy fulness is sad. 
If but their Government decree it so ! 
Attacker thus becomes the one attacked ; 
Assailant is the one who was assailed ; 
Honor belongs to him who honor lacked ; — 

[70] 



Success, the fitting crown for him who failed! 

He but keeps faith who faithless e'er has proved, 

For loss, if viewed aright, is naught but gain ; — 

He, sympathetic, who was never moved 

By sympathy for others' loss or pain ! 

Dost find it hard, indeed, to understand 

With foreign mind this German point of view? 

Doth brain rebel? Doth reason still command 

That false indeed is false, instead of true? 

If so, from such vain foolishness desist 

And learn the lesson in the German School, 

That everything upon which we insist 

Can be, thereby, converted to the rule — 

That naught exists if otherwise than we 

Would have it seem — that thought that would 

aspire 
To other ends, forever false must be 
If incompatible with our desire ! 

December, 1916. 



[71] 



WHAT IS OUR AIM? 

What is thy inner weakness, country mine, 
That, 'midst such cataclysm, doth incline 
Thy heart to things material, and thus 
Cause thee to lose so much that is divine? 

With all the profit made from others' pain, 
How much that, truly, can be counted gain 
In higher sense? — without the which, indeed, 
The net result is futile, cheap and vain ! 

How little from our teeming wealth have we 
Spent in the cause of a true charity. 
E'en to the sore-afflicted innocent 
For whom we would profess such sympathy ! 

How empty, words that are devoid of deed ! 
How scant the crop from such a sterile seed ! 
What lack of character doth it imply — 
What moral loss — and whither may it lead? 

While other nations, in the forge of war, 
Are spirit-tried, correcting flaw 'pon flaw, 
What have we done to strengthen or defend 
Divine, or even human, man-made law? 

We see a devastated, tortured land — 
Its people herded in the slaver's band — 
And yet we idly stand aside and watch 
All unconcerned, nor raise protesting hand ! 
[72] 



We hear of crimes at which the soul doth turn, 
And jet we prate " neutrality," nor spurn 
The hand that drips with blood of innocents, 
Nor feel the righteous anger that should burn ! 

Have we no leader who can take command 
And of the nation's conscience make demand 
For course more in accord with Truth and 

Right — 
For what, within our souls, we feel we stand? 

Or is prosperity our only goal? 

Do wealth and peace but represent the whole 

Aim and ambition of a race of slaves? — 

Have we, to serve this cause, renounced the soul? 

Can we, for moral lack, another blame, 
Or think that none will ridicule our claim 
To championship of fuller liberty ? 
Should we not pause and ask : " What is our 
aim? " 

January, 1917. 



[73] 



TO EUROPE 

Europe, thou land upon whose trodden soil 
Titanic forces battle for the Right — 
Where Principle — in strangle-grip with Might 
And without stomach for such bloody toil — 
Doth now advance, and now again recoil. 
As to the death it doth insist to fight ! 

How many are thy trials now indeed — 

How great the suffering that thou must bear ; 

And yet, perchance, how full beyond compare 

May be the crop from this initial seed — 

The aims for which thou now dost fight and bleed. 

Which yet may bloom in recompenses fair ! 

For thou who wagest battle now dost grow 
In strength of spirit, vigor of the soul. 
That cannot cease to live while time shall roll 
Upon its course unending, but will throw 
A higher light, a more celestial glow, 
'Pon this thy new, thy brighter-shining goal ! 

January, 1917. 



[74] 



OUR DUTY 

From the angnish and the sorrow 
That the world war doth entail 
Are we, of them all, to borrow 
Nothing more of true avail 
Then a full, o'erflowing measure 
Wrung from suffering and pain — 
Naught indeed but earthly treasure 
Without trace of higher gain? 

With our eyes 'pon Europe bleeding 
For a cause as much our own — 
Seeing this, and this conceding. 
Cannot we in part atone 
For our failure of assistance 
To defend a ravished land 
By an earnest, true insistence 
To extend a helping hand? 

Yet how little have we offered 

Of the gold that we have made — 

Sums we've squandered, or but coffered, 

In the effort to evade 

Obligation, deep and lasting, 

'Tis our privilege to meet 

If — by claim aside thus casting — 

We would not our ends defeat! 

For our battle Europe wages — 
Ours and all who claim to stand 
[75] 



'Gainst aggressive Might that rages 
By the power of mailed hand ; 
Egotism, crude and savage, — 
Selfishness personified, 
That, for greed, would kill and ravage 
Those who 'pon their faith relied! 

Wake ! my country, to thy duty ! 

Turn thy vision to the light. 

That thou, too, may sense the beauty 

Of a cause that stands for Right ! 

Lift thy thoughts from wealth amassing ; 

Make a higher aim thy goal ; 

And, like them, reap the surpassing 

Harvest of aspiring soul ! 

January, 1917. 



[76] 



THE ENTENTE REPLY 

With what a ring of true sincerity 

The aims outhned herein must make appeal 

To those who seek the hving verity, 

Which ties of blood and kinship oft' conceal; 

Nor cease to search beneath the surface rim 

That deeper, inner impulse shedding light 

'Pon much that to the public mind is dim, 

Or unperceived at all by common sight ! 

In every word the note of liberty 

Rings firm and true beneath the martial stand — 

No seeming freedom, but reality 

Of liberty for every conquered land 

Wliose people bend beneath the galling yoke 

Of alien despot — wreckage in the flood 

Of foreign aim and purpose that would choke 

The common instinct of a common blood. 

For dynasties that thus would separate 

In mutilated fraction part from whole 

Shut eyes to Nature's way and underrate 

The instinct and the impulse of the soul. 

Nor see that common purpose must relate 

A common mind unto a common goal. 

If, for a time, success would seem to crown 

Their eff^orts to impede a Nature law. 

The rising tide of common blood will drown 

The futile effort and, as bits of straw, 

Those who Avould block, or stay, the human tide 

By force of might — or aught unjust, untrue 

[77] 



Will but be swept away and weakly glide 

Unto the failure that is their just due. 

For as each soul demands that it should be 

A thing distinct, from other soul apart, 

A nation's individuality 

But represents an instinct of the heart 

Which politics, or use of petty force. 

May strive within some channel to restrain, 

All inconsistent with its rightful course — 

But which, at last, must ever strive in vain ! 

And, in its inner essence, how distinct 

Is this from that strange Pan-Germanic dream 

That in its own imagination linked 

The East and West and seemed indeed to deem 

That all the earth should bow unto its rule. 

And bend the knee to some crude Superman 

Prepared to use whole nations as a tool 

To serve the hegemonic Teuton plan! 

For what is this but slavery at last ? — 

A slavery of body and of mind ; 

A crude, barbaric relic of the past 

That we should, long ago, have left behind; 

A vile excrescence of a savage state; 

A growth by selfish greed alone possessed; 

Whose strength, or weakness, can but indicate 

How much a nation has, in truth, progressed! 

But in the melting pot of this world war 
How many past mistakes will be revealed? — 
How many a hidden, universal flaw, 
[78] 



Which 'neath the cloak of custom was concealed, 

Will stand undraped in light of truer law 

And, by a higher court, be now repealed ? — 

How many ideals we have vainly sought 

May now a fuller, richer harvest yield? — 

How many wounds received by those who fought 

Will, by a better, lasting peace be healed? — 

A peace not based on armament, or might. 

But one consistent with the higher plan 

That bows to naught but Justice and the Right — 

The Universal Brotherhood of Man ! 

January, 1917. 



[79] 



WHY ARE WE CARELESS? 

Why are we careless in the face of wrong 

That strives to wreak its will upon the earth 

Which is the common heritage of all, — 

That deems it virtue only to be strong 

And which would strangle even at its birth, 

Or bind beneath some autocratic thrall. 

The ideals we have labored for so long? — 

The just conceptions of a common right 

From nation due to nation, man to man ; — 

A concept in accord with higher plan ; — 

The inner cause of many a bloody fight 

In which the more developed led the van ! 

Are these but empty words to us who pose 

As champions of a fuller liberty ? — 

Is this the feeling of a land that rose 

And fought 'gainst self to stamp out slavery ? — 

Is this the answer we would now disclose 

And write upon the page of history ? — 

The page which, once 'tis writ, can ne'er blot out 

By later deed, more than by scratch of pen. 

The fact that we, by carelessness, did flout 

What should be sacred to all virile men ! 

Are we as weak as this would indicate? — 
Spineless and flabby with the fat of wealth — 
Changed by material gain into a state 
Of low debility of moral health ; — 
A state where naught but riches is the goal, 
The which to gain alone we dare to vie ; — 
[80] 



A state of foul disease wherein the soul 
Will shortly languish, sicken, pine and die ! 
Or is it that imagination we. 
With all our other gifts, fail to possess? — 
And, through this mental blindness, fail to see 
The outcome of the mighty storm and stress 
If those who wage a common war for all 
Who now but stand aside, should lose the fight 
And we, with them, be forced to bear the thrall 
Of bold aggression — crude, barbaric Might. 

If one reply that danger is not there — 
That those who so suggest attempt to breed 
Some spectre form that they, therewith, may 

scare 
The thoughtless and, thereby, attempt to lead 
The nation into paths untried and new — 
For which, in fitting time, it will prepare — 
And that we e'er stand ready to grant due 
And prompt attention where there is the need, 
Then why, I ask, not prove our words are true 
By this the only test — the test of deed? 
For o'er the earth the spectre shape of want 
Stalks as it ne'er has stalked within our time. 
And 'neath its touch whole nations, weak and 

gaunt, — 
The helpless victims of colossal crime — 
Crave for the surplus that we cast aside 
In thoughtless, selfish folly and disdain — 
In egotism and in petty pride — 
But crave, alas ! too often but in vain ! 
[81] 



For what have we contributed to those 

Who bore the brunt and bend beneath the strain 

Of new injustice, e'er increasing woes, 

That is not more than paid for by the gain 

That we have made from their stupendous need — 

Their obhgation to assist and feed 

Those who beneath the tyrant's hand have lain? 

For now a nation's children pine and die 

As victims to some ravaging disease. 

While we stand thoughtlessly and idly by, 

Immersed in wealth and enervating ease — 

Careless alike, 'twould seem, of right and wrong, 

To pleas for help indifferent and cold. 

And only anxious that we may prolong 

The steady, rising stream of shining gold ! 

For what a petty pittance is our share 

When measured with our wealth, our size, our 

pride ; — 
How parsimoniously it doth compare 
With gifts of others, weighted down with care, 
Who yet possess the spirit to divide ! 
Must history within the time to come 
Measure our spirit by this paltry sum ? — 
Must unborn generations rise to blame 
Their forebears lost to proper sense of shame? 
Can we not cast aside indifference 
To all that touches not our ease, or purse ? — 
A moral blindness so widespread and dense 
That it has now become the nation's curse 
And bears within itself a latent sting 
[82] 



That, if permitted to extend and grow, 
Will, through the process of corruption, bring 
Our pride and power to dismal overthrow ! 
Can we not wake from our self-centred dream. 
And by our effort help accelerate 
The onward and progressive march of Fate, 
And with our own eyes catch the distant gleam 
Of righteous purpose, ere it be too late? — 
And while assisting those in dire distress, 
Who strive — as once we did — for liberty. 
Awake the nation's conscience and impress 
Upon our souls a true humanity ! 

January, 1917. 



[83] 



THE DEMAND 

Month follows month and the battle still rages 
In the clouds, under sea, as on the land; 
Weakening Frightfulness babbles and rages, 
Blindly ignoring the world-wide demand. 

Hoping 'gainst hope that the tide that is setting 
Strong 'gainst autocracy still may recede, 
And that the world, all its foul crimes forgetting. 
Grant it the ill-gotten gains of its greed. 

Fiercely it writhes as the grip ever tightens — 
Hopelessly strives by its words to defend 
Unmoral purposes — vainly it frightens 
Those who will see it now through to the end. 

'Tis not a war of a nation 'gainst nation, 
Or of a group 'gainst another group hurled, 
But of the true and the lasting relation 
Of simple faith in a civilized world. 

Honor and truth and a full understanding 
Of the position of weak against strong — 
Earth's common conscience arising, demanding 
Right must e'er win in the battle with Wrong! 

January, 1917. 



[84] 



" ENTANGLING ALLIANCES " 

How often in our ears today resound 
Phrases and words spoke' in a time long past, 
When circumstance was otherwise than now, 
But which have since become tradition-bound. 
And o'er our minds the ancient spell would cast 
Of some supreme and consecrated vow ! 
" Entangling Alliances " is such 
A phrase that has the strength to move and sway 
The thought and purpose of a later day, 
Summoning ghosts of ancient fears that clutch 
The mind and heart, and acting as a stay 
To those who, feeling that it once held much 
Of truth, seem now to see a better way. 
Perchance, when spoken, such advice had need 
Of prompt acceptance by a land but young 
And all unused to full self-government. 
Lest some into seductive paths should lead 
Its untried steps, and, doing so, had wrung — 
At the dictate of alien lust and greed — 
A course of action that it might repent. 
Or which, in other, foreign lands, might breed 
A strong determination to resent. 
But does not such a stand as this imply 
A certain state of immaturity — 
The feeling that a full security 
Must ever in complete aloofness lie.? 
Is't not, indeed, the instinct felt of old 
B}'^ every stranger in a foreign land, 
That common fellowship he must withhold 
[85] 



As all men's hands were turned against his 

hand? — 
The feeling that each man must be prepared 
To act as judge and jury of his right; — 
That bond of common fellowship impaired 
His liberty, or led to needless fight? 

How much, as individual, had man 
'Neath civilizing influence progressed 
Had he adhered to such uncultured plan, 
Nor later, by his action, had confessed 
That what is best for all is best for one — 
That units but make up the sum of all, — 
And that, if each would hold what he has won. 
He must give ear unto the common call 
And add his ounce of effort and of weight — 
His modicum of credit, or of blame, — 
To bring us nearer to that perfect state 
Where Right and Obligation are the same. 
If this be so with individual 
Within the common family of race. 
Why not, indeed, with nations e'en as well? — 
For, only so, humanity can trace 
Its forward progress o'er the shifting sands 
Of racial, or of national, desire — 
The all-divergent aims of many lands 
Which ne'er to common purposes aspire. 
He who would do his duty in the world 
Must ever stand for Right against the Wrong — 
For weak against the bold, aggressive strong — 
E'en if, by doing so, he should be hurled 
[86] 



Into the bloody vortex of the fight 

And, taking up position for the Right, 

See his proud banner to the winds unfurled! 

But how can this be done if we withdraw 

From out the common circle of mankind? 

And hesitate to plunge ourselves in war 

Because 'tis " brutal," " callous," " unrefined " — 

Because we are too proud indeed to fight 

And thereby help uphold the common law 

Of nations, which — if to a critic's sight 

'Tis incomplete and not devoid of flaw — 

Still represents the common sense of right. 

What progress had humanity e'er made 
If those who heard gave heed not to the call, 
But from the scene withdrew, thus to evade 
The obligation resting 'pon us all? 
Where had we been had others so contrived 
To still the silent whisper of the soul — 
Where had we been if help had not arrived 
To help us on our march towards Freedom's goal? 
'Tis true we want no secret treaty pact 
With foreign government, for foreign aim, 
Binding upon the nation's soul a claim 
And which concurrence by the people lacked ; — 
Some treaty for aggression, not defense. 
Some bond that ever holds us at the call 
Of foreign voice — whose only recompense 
Would be the binding 'pon us of a thrall. 
Were not, indeed, entanglements like these 
The ones then uppermost within the mind 
[87] 



Of him who spake the words and sought to ease 
Our future path, insisting that we bind 
No foreign yoke upon the nation's brow, 
Or by such treaty tie the nation's hands 
That we, to keep a solemn, plighted vow. 
Must labor for the cause of foreign lands? 
So would it seem ! And so, indeed, 'twere wise ! 
But time has onward moved and changed since 

then! 
And now upon the path before our eyes 
Appears a vision which all virile men 
Cannot but see and, seeing, stand prepared 
To face and meet — whate'er result may be — 
Remembering he only did who dared 
To risk himself to aid humanity ! 
And we must still remember that a Right 
Is by an Obligation e'er offset. 
And if the first demand that we should fight, 
The latter would insist that we forget 
Our selfish aims and purposes alone — 
Self-centred instincts of the mind and heart — 
And but remember that we now have grown 
Unto full stature and must do our part ! 

January, 1917. 



[88] 



TO THE ENTENTE ALLIES 

Hail ! to thee, Allies ! — waging, in the van, 

The war for civilized humanity ! — 

Who, with thy full combined strength, now strive 

To loose the bonds that lustful greed would rive — 

Lnpelled thereto by selfish vanity — 

Upon the body and the soul of Man ! 

'Tis well that earth contains some races still 
Unspoiled by bloated wealth, untouched by fear. 
Who yet can dare to battle for the Right, 
Nor have become too soft, " too proud to fight " 
For what all virile men should hold most dear — 
Which, to uphold, their hearts' blood they will 
spill ! 

Yet, for the sacrifices thou hast made 

In blood and treasure, for thy pain and woes, 

Thy hearts to higher purpose have been steeled; 

And, later, all thy suffering may yield 

A bounteous harvest all unknown to those 

Who moral obligation would evade! 

Like Phoenix from its ashes then will rise 

Each nation's consciousness — true hearts that beat 

With one accord in every valiant son 

Whose personal self-sacrifice has won 

The gratitude wherewith the world will greet 

The world's defenders — The Entente Allies ! 

Januarv, 1917. 

[89] 



THE GERMAN MEXICAN PLOT AND ITS 
ATTEMPTED JUSTIFICATION 

Duplicity piled on duplicity ; 

Dishonor to dishonor added on ; 

Shame but with shame compounded more and 

more; 
Each further proof of its complicity 
But adds its weight unto a whole world's scorn, 
And cries yet louder for the final score — 
Whate'er the cost in treasure and in gore — 
When higher, truer standards shall be born ! 

Why hesitate in incredulity, 

Or waste our energy in useless blame — 

A strength that can be better used in act? 

For patience hath become futility ; 

Reason with such has lost its primal claim 

And will our effort only counteract 

If in them now we fail to glimpse the fact 

Of one as lost to honor as to shame. 

March, 1917. 



[90] 



REALIZATION 

At last we have abandoned the attempt 
To make those see who, morally, are blind 
To that which to the world at large is plain ; — 
The which they treat with ill-disguised contempt 
And, with aggressive insolence, would bind 
With the same bonds beneath which they have 
lain ; — 

Those bonds imposed by autocratic rule, 

Which molds and bends a nation 'neath its sway, 

Making a thoughtless people but a tool 

With which to cleave its misdirected way. 

Long have we recognized its selfish aims 

In starting, unprovoked, a world-wide war ; 

Long have we borne its crude, aggressive claims 

To be, itself, dictator of all law ; — 

The which insists that what it does is right ; 

That what all others do perforce is wrong ; — 

The law that rules the brute — the law of Might, 

Which deems it virtue only to be strong! 

But patience, be it pressed too far, must yield 
To other guiding force, the which will lend 
The needed strength another tool to wield 
When kind forbearance comes, at last, to end. 
Thus have we striven 'gainst intolerance ; — 
Thus have we vainly tried to alter fate, 
While many thought we looked 'pon war askance. 
Nor had the courage to retaliate! 
[91] 



E'en here at home the thought began to grow 
That we were so immersed in selfish gain 
That, rather than provoke the common foe, 
We would permit our shield to bear the stain. 

But we have reached the parting of the ways — 
Have wakened from our hope-inspired dream — 
And though none can forecast what coming days 
May hold in store, yet we have caught the gleam 
That lights the hearts of other lands today, 
Inspires their souls and kindles in their eyes — 
The spirit that crude " Frightfulness " defies 
And prompts them — rather than concede its 

sway 
And bow before delusion, or weak fear, — 
To bring and, 'pon the nation's altar, lay 
Their lives and all in life they hold most dear. 

However much, at first, the war appeared 

To be a thing apart from our concern, 

Each day that's passed has, by so much, but 

cleared 
Such misconception and we now discern 
The fundamental forces here arrayed, 
Each against each, in final bloody fight — 
The force of Justice as opposed to Might — 
The issue we no longer can evade 
If we ourselves would champion the Right ! 
God grant that in the test that lies ahead 
The nation's courage prove indeed that we 

[92] 



Have not grown weak, that still our hearts are 

wed — 
As in the past they were — to Liberty ! 
God grant that in the trial of the soul 
That every passing hour brings more near 
We may approach more closely to the goal 
Of earthly life — may recognize more clear' 
The great and primal truths that life may teach 
If we but raise our eyes from off the ground — 
The spirit truths, beneficent, profound, 
Which, here and now, are yet within our reach ; — 
Pure gold that will repay the toil of each, 
But which must first be searched — if ever found ! 

February, 1917. 



[93] 



POEMS OF PHILOSOPHY 



CIVILIZATION 

Civilization ! What portends this word 

So often and inconsequently heard 

'Pon lips that would some other sense convey 

Than that deep, inner one it should portray? 

Is it no other than that thin veneer — 

That weak disguise — that superficial sheath — 

Which claims to be that which it would appear, 

But hides the truer nature underneath? 

Is it but wealth and affluence attained — 

More complex needs and artifices gained — 

Conventionalities of modern life — 

Cessation from the cruder forms of strife? 

The luxury that wealth alone may bring — 

That will-o'-wisp that serves as the excuse 

For much of effort — yet which holds a sting 

For those who fail to grasp its proper use? 

Is't learning merely — knowledge broad and 

deep — 
Which we may turn to gain, or may employ 
In such a way as, from this seed, to reap 
A scanty crop of pleasure — if not joy? 
All these, indeed, but, more than all combined, 
Civilization, properly refined. 
Contains a meaning deeper far than these — 
A craving which they all cannot appease. 
For all of these possess a common aim — 
In all of them the motive is the same — 
Self, self, and ever self — in part or whole — 
Self — both the inspiration and the goal ! 
[97] 



Is such a selfish purpose cause for pride? 
Is't not, indeed, one rather to deride? 
A purpose now outHved and to be cast 
Aside, as some crude relic of the past ! 
Effort alone for purely selfish gain 
Is but an impulse barbarous and rude; 
The savage fights to grasp, or to retain, — 
The brute itself will battle for its brood ! 
Yet, for the term itself how little ground — 
What empty title is thereby conferred — 
When 'mong the leaders is so often found 
But masked contempt for faith or plighted word! 
How little of its inner essence won 
When honor's deemed a weakness to deride, 
And solemn, binding treaties looked upon 
As " scraps of paper " to be cast aside ! 
Whatever height of culture be his claim — 
Whate'er his wealth, or influence, may be — 
A man, or nation, with no higher aim 
Is still deep sunk in crude barbarity ! 
That nation, choosing as the better part 
A blind adherence to such selfish goal, 
But breeds a canker festering at the heart 
Which, in the end, corrupts the living soul! 
But, when we stand for honor, true and tried, 
For truth, for right, for justice, — these alone — 
Then may we feel, indeed, a worthy pride 
That to a fuller stature we have grown ! 
When from such petty selfishness we're free 
And, in a common term, can but define 
The common justice due to Me and Thee — 
[98] 



And Mine becomes coincident with Thine — 

When our own obligation and the right 

Of others form the goal for which Man strives, 

Civilization, as the morning light, 

Will shed its beams upon our common lives ! 



[99] 



TRADITION'S SWAY 

How firm the grip that holds our minds in thrall 
To worn and outgrown feelings of the past ! 
How strong the bonds, deep-riveted and fast, 
By which Tradition binds and, though they gall 
And chafe our souls, how difficult to cast 
From out our lives ! How endlessly they last — 
How much impede and stifle Nature's call ! 

If we but delve in scientific lore. 

Biologists would teach us to believe 

That every living mortal doth receive 

One quarter from each parent, half this store 

From each grand-parent, which indeed would leave 

One quarter of each self as legacy 

From distant ancestors who've gone before ! 

And this asserted fact perchance, if true. 
Doth many seeming mysteries explain ; 
Suggests the answer, often sought in vain; 
Or, if not all, at least provides a clue 
To atavistic thought in modern brain 
Which, as a relic of ancestral strain. 
So oft', in trend of mind is brought to view ! 

Perchance this doth explain that tendency 
To think in terms of generations gone ; 
To treat but lightly newer standards won, 
And ever o'er them grant ascendency 
To thought passed down from father unto son — 
[100] 



A mode of thought in distant ages born — 
A now outlived and useless legacy ! 

And he who, lacking in reliant mind, 
Finds it more simple to accept the thought 
Of other minds, is ever straightway caught 
In crude Tradition's net and thus would bind 
Himself as slave — a victim cheaply bought 
But dearly sold — his life thereafter fraught 
With little hope, a fuller truth, to find ! 

And if Tradition's word we deem the last 
And best in Spirit thought, why not allow 
It fuller, freer sway and make our bow 
To all the outgrown customs of the past? 
Why not the savage form of life avow 
If savage thought prevail and, here and now, 
All other gains into the discard cast? 



[101] 



LIFE 

How strangely fashioned is the human mind — 
So constituted that it e'er must reach 
And pin its faith to miracle, nor find 
The miracles that Life itself can teach ! 
The wonders which take place before our eyes 
And yet in which no wonder we can trace, 
Which, at the most, we treat with mild sur- 
prise 
Because they have become so commonplace, 
So much a part of this our daily life 
That they have lost the power to command 
Our reverent thought — those miracles so rife 
That they appear each day on every hand. 
'Twould seem the mind must ever vainly strive 
To force belief where this itself is vain 
And 'gainst all reason and, thereby, contrive 
To place 'pon this God-given mind the stain 
Of ignorant credulity, the ban 
Of foolish, superstitious awe and dread — 
The crude conceptions of the early Man — 
The legacy — to living — from the dead ! 
And, as we strive to force our minds to grasp 
And reason to retain some useless thought, 
How many miracles elude our clasp 
The which, if but as vigilantly sought, 
Would yield rich truths, increasing more and 

more — 
Those vital truths with which, indeed, are fraught 
All things in life — Nature's exhaustless store ! 
[102] 



And such a miracle is Life itself! 
A miracle, indeed, compared with which 
All those crude concepts of the early Man — 
Those weird exceptions some must still allow 
To Nature's primal, unexcepting plan — 
Become as petty baubles of a child. 
Wherewith alone the childish mind can play, — 
AVhich immaturity alone beguiled 
And, in beguiling, led the mind astray. 
But even those whom superstitious awe 
Holds not in leash to fear — yea ! even they 
Who by the higher sciences are led 
And deem the Tinith their one and only goal, 
How oft', instead of truth, are they not wed 
To scientific creed, and pay the toll 
In clouded reason that can never shed 
One ray of light to the enquiring soul? 
To such as these Life is no miracle, — 
Daily perfonned before our wondering ej^es, 
In all the kingdoms of the sentient earth, 
By some High Power we cannot e'en surmise 
Which, through the processes of death and birth, 
Conditions Life and teaches Man to rise 
To greater heights and more exalted worth, — 
And to biology, indeed, they turn 
To prove the process quite within their reach 
And, grasping physiology, would spurn 
The vital truths which Life alone can teach! 
And driven to defense of this their plan 
And mode of reason — this hypothesis 
By which they would account for Conscious Man 
[103] 



And for the breath of Life he doth possess — 

They, with their backs firm' set against the wall 

Of scientific creed they would defend, 

Claim that the molecule possesses all 

And, from its boundless store, indeed, would lend 

To rock, to tree, to animal, to man 

All those distinctive attributes and powers 

Which, in accordance with eternal plan. 

Nature herself each sep'rate kingdom dowers. 

They seem to think that no controlling hand 

Need guide the issue — no controlling brain 

Conceive, devise, contrive, o'erlook, command, 

Lest, uncontrolled, the plan itself prove vain ; 

And to the atom they bequeath this power — 

To it alone they would, indeed, relate 

All such stupendous force, and it would dower 

With attributes we cannot contemplate 

Without an overwhelming rush of awe, 

A true conception of our pygmy size, 

In presence of such Universal Law 

And Him who such a law could e'en devise! 

How paltry seems such reasoning as this — 
How all unworthy even of that part 
Of Universal Mind in every brain, 
Which quickens to the beating of each heart ! 
Thus from Supreme Intelligence they take 
All part or parcel in the scheme of things, 
Nor seem to realize that, thus, they make 
The molecule itself the King of Kings ! 
And thus, again, the Golden Calf they raise, 
[104] 



In crude assumption, to the regal throne, 

And to the atom render all their praise. 

Thinking thereby its Master to disown ! 

And having thus denied, ruled out of court, 

All that points to Supreme Intelligence, 

They laugh to scorn, make light of, treat as sport, 

All reference to those Life Elements 

By which all things that live may be controlled — 

That govern all that is in Heaven or Earth — 

And which, when fuller knowledge doth unfold. 

May prove to be of Truth itself the birth ! 

Life Elements the which we dimly sense 

Throughout all life's apparent war and strife. 

Whose single purpose, final recompense. 

Is but to raise to higher forms of life — 

To fuller, quicker vibratory power — 

All things that are on land, in sky, or sea. 

And with a keener consciousness endower 

Immortal soul throughout eternity ! 

First, as Electro-Magnetism, we 
Discern its action in the flinty rock, 
As in all else within that kingdom we 
Are wont to call the purely Mineral. 
And here doth atom ever work and strive; 
Here what seems dead is fraught with pulsing life 
As, 'neath the action of Affinity, — 
Responding to Attraction's mighty force — 
Each single atom, as 'tis polarized. 
Does meet and part and meet and part again 
With those its opposites, inspired thereto 
[105] 



A lasting union to at last attain. 

Perchance within the field of chemistry 

We see most clearly this unending strife 

Of atom with its neighbor atom in 

The kingdom of the Mineral alone. 

Change, ever change, a constant flux and flow 

Of active unto passive — positive 

Unto the one receptively inclined — 

The effort of each one to find its mate ; 

And, till in one the two may be combined, 

Neither can this, its primal longing, sate. 

And in the effort, in the constant change. 

The meeting and the parting, ebb and flow, 

Nature herself would seem but to arrange 

That each becomes refined, that both must grow 

In higher, fuller vibratory force 

And, 'neath the guiding Universal Will, 

Continue unimpeded in their course 

To higher forms of life and action still. 

Thus doth the atom in the mineral — 

That thing we look upon as cold and dead — '■ 

Work out its evolutionary way 

As, by Supreme Intelligence, 'tis led 

To fashion, even here, its destiny ! 

And having reached at last the utmost bounds 
Of this its kingdom, does it not, perchance, 
Come under influence of another law — 
A higher law which must, indeed, enhance 
Its power of action, for the element 
Of higher life now exercises sway, 
[106] 



To whose dictates it can but give consent — 
And, now, the Vito-Chemical obey? 
And though Electro-Magnetism's force 
Remains unchecked, the higher law has rule 
And takes precedence of the other now. 
And ever onward guides the atom's course! 
And this, the second Element of Life, 
Rules o'er the second kingdom in the scheme 
Of Nature's plan, and takes beneath its sway 
All in the field of vegetable life. 
And now, with fuller attributes and powers, 
Atom is with a fuller life endowed ; 
Power of assimilation and of growth ; 
The attribute that makes it possible 
To take the oxygen from out the air. 
Carbon-dioxide from the fetid breath 
Of dead and decomposing substances. 
And to assimilate the properties 
Of air and earth and water to its use 
And, from the three combined, to build itself 
In root and branch, in stem, in leaf, in bark, 
To diverse forms unique, majestic, grand, 
That in their rich luxuriance of grace 
Our sense of admiration must command. 
With how much grace, indeed, does Nature dower 
This form of life, so pleasing to the eye — 
The grace of form and color, leaf and flower. 
Which all our imitation must defy ! 
And now within its veins the sap of life 
Courses apace, while through the myriad pores 
Upon each leaf the breath of life is drawn, 
[107] 



And matter, seeming dead, to life is born. 
And now that wond'rous Principle of Life 
Which we call Sex doth here more plainly show, 
And reproduction takes the place of strife, 
Of endless change, of constant flux and flow; 
And Male and Female now appear distinct, 
Unique in form, apparent to the eye, 
Yet, though divided, still, as ever, linked 
Within the bonds of close affinity. 
Active and passive, now distinct and clear, 
Act and react and, like to like, but draw, 
While, from the union, beauteous flowers appear — 
The efflorescence of Attraction's Law. 
How great advance would seem such life as this 
O'er that of atom in the flinty rock — 
A door to progress which an element 
Of higher life could thus, alone, unlock ! 

But here again, as in the lower realm, 
Constant reaction must at last refine 
And vegetable matter reach and pass 
The outward post, the great dividing line 
That separates one kingdom from the next, 
And vegetation, on its upward way, 
Reaches the Kingdom of the Animal 
Where still a higher law exerts its sway. 
Spiritual the element that rules 
O'er matter now, though both the others still 
Exert their influence and, though dethroned 
From highest place, yet exercise their will 
In many ways of action still beyond 
[108] 



Our power of analysis to find, 

To which this higher life must yet respond — 

Bonds which, though loosed, must still forever 

bind! 
And matter now takes on another form 
Distinct from all within the realms below 
And from the single nucleated cell 
Animal form arises, and doth grow 
To all those strange diversities of shape 
That populate the water, land and air. 
And lend to Nature's book of life so much 
Of that that is most delicate and fair. 
And here, again, are higher powers conferred. 
And attributes unknown to rock and tree — 
Sensations which no lower kingdom stirred. 
But indicate the upward climb which we, 
With all in nature, have so long maintained — 
A climb towards life more full, diverse and free. 
Here locomotion, guided by the will. 
Releases life from its confining cell. 
And Nature bids the senses drink their fill 
Of sight and hearing, touch and taste and smell! 
Here vocal sound is granted unto life ; 
Instinct and intuition here we find ; 
And we discern, 'midst seeming war and strife, 
First indications of a heart and mind. 
Here Sex again exerts a fuller force 
And whispers in no undecided voice 
That Life hereafter must pursue its course 
Through individuality of choice. 
This is her mandate and her just decree: 
[109] 



A greater heterogeneity ; 

A life more diverse, complex, broad and free; 

A fuller individuality ; 

That ever more and more refined may be 

All life beneath her law — Affinity ! 

Again how great the change this kingdom shows 

From that, the one immediately below ; 

With what high powers and attributes it glows 

In these the gifts that Nature doth bestow! 

But, once again, the border-land is reached, 
And Life, approaching now the final goal 
Yet known to earth, the highest Element 
Of Life confers 'pon us, immortal soul. 
And, with this highest gift 'pon us bestowed. 
We bow to the Soul Element's control. 
Once more how vast the difference we see 
Between the Kingdom of the Brute and Man ; 
How much advance, what great disparity 
'Twixt it and all the others of the plan ; 
How broad the field wherein our lives are cast ; 
To what high powers our senses are refined ; 
How long the road from dim and distant past 
To individuality defined ; 

And what rich stores of truth to be amassed 
By quickened soul and spirit, heart and mind! 
Self-consciousness and consciousness of selves 
Outside of self the lower laws refute, 
And set that boundary impassable 
By which we are divided from the brute. 
But, while they yield control, the elements 
[110] 



Of lower life exert their influence still 

And, conscious' or unconsciously, dictate 

Much of our action and our thought until. 

Through long experience within the School 

Of Life, we learn to bring them 'neath the Will 

And make them bow to its unquestioned rule. 

And Will, with Reasoning-Conscience as its guide, 

Itself provides a stimulus, or ban. 

And points the way whereby we may decide 

If thought and act concur but with the plan 

Of Nature's law, wherein she doth provide 

The course of action for Self-Conscious Man. 

For in this kingdom now she grants us leave 

To judge for self alone — comply or sin — 

That, through our choice, we may at last achieve 

Those fuller gifts which we shall surely win 

If we can but her purposes descry 

Through work and effort and, when found, hold 

fast, 
Conform thereto and with them all comply — 
Thereby attaining Happiness at last! 

And here, far more than in the lower realms. 
We find that Sex — that Principle of Life — 
Has greater power ; uplifts or quite o'erwhelms ; 
Conditions harmony ; engenders strife — 
According as our knowledge of her law 
And force of will permit, indeed, that we 
The just and right conclusions therefrom draw — 
In full accord with true Affinity. 
And here, beneath the Element of Soul, 
[111] 



How different the Principle of Sex — 
Law of Attraction and Affinity — 
From that which drew the atom to its kind 
Within the flinty bosom of the rock ! 
How differs it from that unfeeling force — 
That blind, unseeing urge that caused the plant 
To cast its pollen to the restless wind 
That, borne upon its wings, it might at last 
Reach some unknown, unseen, unthought-of mate 
And thereby finictify and come to flower 
When it itself is withered, dry and dead ! 
How different e'en from the animal 
Which, by a passion physical impelled, 
But follows Nature's first and primal law, 
And mates and leaves and mates and leaves again. 
For, here. Sex enters deep within the heart 
And, deeper still, within 'the conscious soul. 
And to them both doth inwardly impart 
Some faint foreknowledge of the final goal 
Towards which we tend — some intuition bring 
Of all that lies in store for us when we 
Have cast off flesh and, free upon the wing, 
Soul meets with soul in true affinity. 
For must not such a Principle of Life, 
That through all nature holds unerring course. 
Persist and grow as it has grown while here. 
But grow still more in power and depth and force 
Till it so far transcends the thing we know 
As ours transcends the atom's cosmic urge. 
Revealing beauties which must ever flow 
From this, the fountain head of Sex, to purge 
[112] 



All grosser forms and show how we may find 
That faint and distant yet clear-shining goal 
Where sex appeals to sex as mind to mind, 
And true attraction centres in the soul? 



[113] 



MYSTERIES 

What mysteries are Life and Consciousness ! 

However much our sciences may teach 

Of Nature secrets we must yet confess 

That these remain still far beyond our reach! 

For life we see, where'er we turn our eyes, 

In different forms embodied, yet the same 

In vital principle — but none so wise 

As to explain from whence, or how, it came! 

In all the kingdoms of the sentient earth 

Life, changing forms and purposes, assumes — 

Yet ever Life presides at every birth, 

Stirs in the bud and in the blossom blooms ! 

E'en if our scientists at last succeed 

In summoning the principle at call 

And generating life — where doth it lead ? — 

They have not solved the riddle of it all ! 

For life itself and all it doth imply 

Would still remain a nature mystery — 

Untouched, unheard, unseen by mortal eye, 

Eluding e'er the page of history ! 

E'en so with Consciousness, which we can sense 
But through itself, yet ever fail to find 
Its inner cause, or how it came, or whence. 
Or where located in the human mind. 
Its side physiological we trace. 
And note how messages to sense are ta'en 
Upon the atmospheric waves of space 
To be transmitted to the human brain 
[114] 



O'er lines of nerve, fine as the finest lace, 
Wliich carry all that can be counted gain 
And lend to life and consciousness their grace. 
But, sensing this, our knowledge stops, and we 
Fail to perceive how something physical. 
Within the twinkling of an eye, can be 
Transmuted into something psychical. 
For sight waves, sound waves, waves of taste and 

smell, 
As waves of touch — as nerve and brain as well — 
Are differing forms of the material. 
But consciousness quite otherwise would seem ; — 
A vital essence quite beyond our call ; — 
Intangible and subtle as a dream — 
And yet the solid basis of it all! 

What paradox — what mystery — is here ! — 
What miracle performed before our eyes ! — 
So all unknown and yet so trite and near 
That few e'en treat it with a mild surprise. 
But take as simplest commonplace of fact 
A process that has ever to the wise 
Appeared as, of them all, the nature act 
That furthest from our understanding lies ! 
Should this realization not give pause 
To those who, with undue temerity. 
Think they can trace out every subtle cause 
Of life and thought — can label Nature's laws 
And judge forthwith what can and cannot be? 
For in this transmutation to the realm 
Of psychic from the physical we find 
[115] 



That we have lost our grip upon the helm 
When entering the region of the Mind ; 
And we can dimly sense that out beyond — 
Deep in the inner kingdom of the Soul — 
Lie many hidden truths that will respond 
To growing thought as age 'pon age doth roll 
O'er this our journey towards the final goal! 



[116] 



THE RIDDLE OF THE UNIVERSE 

What an absorbing mystery is life, 

And sense, and thought, and all that Nature shows 

In this the riddle of the universe — 

A riddle that more complicated grows 

As growing knowledge doth extend the view. 

Disclosing much before unseen, unheard. 

And showing things we had believed absurd 

To be not so, but definite and true ! 

Within the space of but a hundred years — 
But little more than one brief human life — 
The elements of which all is composed 
Have, to our higher knowledge, been increased 
One hundred fold compared with what they Avere 
When man in foolish pride did think that he — 
At least of crude and inorganic life — 
Had counted all and solved the mystery. 

And e'en of those, the older elements — 

Those which for many centuries were known — 

Whose limits man had thought he understood — 

Have, 'neath a fuller understanding, grown 

So much in power and in complexitj' 

That, while some inner secret they reveal, 

The light of truth but adds perplexity 

By showing how much more they still conceal ! 

Isomerism and allotropy 
But indicate how far we have to go — 
[117] 



How weak and impotent our chemistry 

To teach us all that we have yet to know 

About the inner secret of the cell, 

The energy the molecules contain, 

The powers that in electron surge and swell, 

Or in the atom latently have lain. 

For now we see that three things so distinct 

As graphite, charcoal, diamond, are the same — 

Full children all of carbon — brothers linked 

By common parentage in all but name. 

Twin brothers of the one and self-same womb, 

Opacity, obscure as darkest night. 

By some strange power emerges from the tomb. 

Reflecting rays of scintillating light ! 

And yet between the coal and diamond we 

Within their atoms can no difference find — 

Note the result, indeed, but fail to see 

The subtle law that, thus, would seem to bind — 

With isomeric, allotropic spell. 

Which we can but most faintly comprehend, — 

The shining light of heaven with darkest hell 

To serve its own unseen and hidden end! 

How many secrets, riven from the breast 
Of Nature's self, the mind of man has won ! 
How many more await his earnest quest — 
Secrets whose being he has just begun 
To dimly sense amidst surrounding gloom — 
The early morn of ignorance and youth — 
[118] 



But which, with Time's advancing day, will bloom 
Beneath the full, refulgent light of Truth — 
Truth, whose resplendent beams will dissipate 
The lingering dusk of superstitious night 
And point to man how much doth still await 
His further search for knowledge and for light ! 



[119] 



PROGRESSING CONTINUITY 

Why is it that the common human mind 

Doth ever show a strange perversity 

Towards newer truth, and ever strives to draw 

Some false deduction, failing thus to find 

For what we know as immortality 

A ground consistent with true Nature's law? 

Thus do we find that many, if not most, 

Accept the thought in principle at least 

If it be served to them within a form 

With which they are familiar from their youth, 

No matter how antagonistic this 

May be to Nature's laws as they appear 

To work unchanging 'neath the mighty plan 

That guides their constant course from year to 

year. 
And so hath ever seemed to do since man 
Could sense a truth so simple and so clear. 

And these must ever pin their faith to that 
Which has no firm foundation base in fact — 
Must e'er believe the unbelievable, 
Strive to conceive the inconceivable — 
And by their thought, as also by their act. 
Reduce the human mind to nullity. 
If but tradition has impressed its seal 
Upon some superstition of the past. 
That ignorance has ever handed down 
From father unto son, with earnest zeal 
Worthy of better cause, they clasp it fast 
[120] 



Unto their breasts and ever after frown 

'Pon any explanation that would throw 

The subject matter into clearer view, 

More consonant with what we know to be 

The laws of Nature, 'neath which we but grow 

From superstitious untruth towards the true 

And just conception of reality. 

And if one comes who would attempt to tell 

That fuller knowledge is Avithin our reach 

If we would grasp — that pearly heaven, and hell 

Of brimstone, which theology did teach. 

Are naught but figments of deluded mind — 

We howl him down as one without control 

Of sense or reason and more firmly bind 

These superstitious shackles 'pon the soul. 

Whate'er his standing be 'midst those Avho lead 

The march of thought and true discovery — 

Whate'er his reputation in the past 

For knowledge and research — we now must need 

Look on him as one past recovery. 

Whose further words we should aside but cast 

As all unAvorthy of a just regard — 

And him from further confidence debarred. 

If one who has devoted all his life 
To study of the future state of man. 
Through all the channels that may cast some light 
'Pon what may be our Mother Nature's plan 
For further growth of human soul and mind, — 
Howe'er inscrutable the subject seem 
[121] 



To those Avho have not deeply delved therein — 

Should then attempt to show that we may find 

The future life quite other than our dream 

Of pure perfection, quite devoid of sin, 

But natural as this one here below. 

With human passions, human right and wrong. 

Unending opportunity to grow 

And change that which is weak to what is strong, 

We, all unthinking, voice a sharp dissent, 

Treat him with scorn, or thoughtless levity. 

And seem with undue anger to resent 

That all seems not as we had thought should be. 

We ask for " proofs " and scrutinize them well, 
With minds prepared to pick some petty flaw. 
Nor ask what " proof " we have of " heaven," or 

" hell," 
Nor how the}' coincide with Nature's law 
That, throughout all the ages, clearly shows 
That she works not by sudden leap and bound, 
But that through slow advance, deep and pro- 
found, 
All life from low to higher standard grows. 
What is it that, in many, seems to rise 
In opposition to the plan that we 
See in all things — why must we close our eyes 
To such a form of immortality.'' 

What could be better for the human soul 
Than such progressing continuity — 
Is not the ever-distant, shining goal 

[122] 



A brighter future than maturity 
That has naught else to which it can aspire — 
No further aim for which the heart may yearn - 
No forward path to which the eyes may turn - 
No hope to cHmb from high estate to higher? 
Whate'er the future state in truth may be, 
All evidence that Nature hath to lend 
Towards a slow continuance would tend, 
Such as in all about us now we see — 
A slow, but sure, progression without end 
Towards the which we must forever bend 
Our earnest effort through eternity ! 



[123] 



A POSSIBLE GAIN! 

Who knows but that one product of the war 
May be a fuller, truer, brighter light 
Upon the constant course of Nature Law 
'Gainst whose acceptance we must ever fight 
With all our strength, or so at least 'twould 

seem — 
Deeming that all not plain and clear to sight 
Can be naught else but figment of a dream ! 
Thus we frown down the spiritistic claim 
That life beyond the gate of death is known 
Still to persist, and heap unmeasured blame 
'Pon him who to this way of thought has grown. 
E'en if a lifetime's study it implies. 
The careful weighing of all evidence, 
Tested by all that wisdom can devise. 
To check an overweening confidence. 
No matter what his eminence may be 
Within the field of learning and of thought. 
The most uncultured fool assumes that he 
Is, by this stand, to just derision brought. 
And mocks mth bitter scorn, or petty jest. 
Weighty opinions that did ne'er command 
A careful thought by one who, at his best. 
Is too ill fitted e'en to understand ! 

It seems the fashion now to mock and jeer 
All who from the material would stray 
To paths less known, less recognized and clear. 
But which for all we know may point the way 
[124] 



To nature secrets we have never guessed, 

Because our minds, by dogma and by creed — 

Or concepts crude, material — possessed, 

Proved sterile ground for new and finer seed. 

But if we scan the pages of the past. 

We find 'twas ever thus — that he who brought 

A new and revolutionary thought 

Was ever by the common mind outcast. 

He who first taught that earth, and not the sun. 

Divided light from darkness, day from night, — 

Imposing each in its diurnal run — 

Was deemed abhorrent in the common sight. 

Two thousand years ago the man who shed 

The light of newer truth, his age defied; 

Was mocked and scourged, as helpless victim 

led. 
And, as a common felon, crucified. 

Thus is it even so today with those 
Who sense a truth unseen by common eye. 
Which ever to the new and strange would close, 
And, with a firm determination, try 
To pin its faith still firmer to a creed 
That's now outgrown and should be left behind 
If we would look for harvest from the seed 
Of slow but sure maturing human mind. 
But in the cataclysm of the war 
So much has gone that we considered fast, 
That reverence for pure archaic law — 
Wliich ever binds the present to the past — 
Has loosed its hold, revealing many a flaw 
[125] 



That shows that much, once held, should be out- 
cast. 
And as beneath the daily battle strain 
The things material have lost their hold 
Upon the heart and spirit of mankind. 
The inner, deeper self that oft' has lain 
In dormant state may now, perchance, unfold 
To broader vision, and the spirit find 
That life is not, as it at first had seemed, 
A thing material in thought and act. 
But something broader, fuller, more complete. 
More comprehensive, satisfying, meet. 
And that some things about which we had dreamed 
May have a sure foundation base in fact. 
Such things as this we ne'er can hope to see 
While soul to things material we bind 
And shut our eyes to Truth's advancing light ; 
But with a spirit purged, enfranchised, free. 
Who knows the fuller truths that we may find 
Which even now, if dim, appear to sight? 

And some among the more advanced in thought — 

Howe'er their fellows may attempt deride — 

Have even now some indications caught 

Of those who labor on the other side — 

Those who through death their liberty have 

bought 
And crossed the unknown gulf — the Great 

Divide ! 
Each year — each month — that passes o'er our 

head 

[126] 



But weakens so much the dividing wall 

That separates the " living " from the " dead " 

Till now, at times, we hear the spirit call 

Assuring us that life is not in vain ; 

That death is the beginning, not the end ; 

And that what, to the spirit, stands for gain 

Will not indeed be lost but, rather, lend 

Full compensation on the other plane 

Towards the which our lagging footsteps bend. 

And what the treasure lost? — lives cast away 

In service of the cause they deem is right? — 

If quickened spirit see the light of day 

Dispelling superstition's darkest night 

In wliich the mind has groped and soul has pined. 

Spending its little hour in futile strife. 

In unavailing search that it may find 

The answer to the riddle we call Life! 

For if the war bring such a recompense 

'Tis cheaply bought, whate'er the cost may be ; 

For then all starting on the journey hence 

Will know that life is continuity 

Of that they know — not separate, distinct, 

But firmly and inseparably linked 

Throughout the reaches of eternity ! 



[127] 



THOUGHTS ON A DEW-DROP 

Upon a blade of grass a dew-drop glows — 

A quivering, scintillating, little gem 

Of living moisture — which, e'en in repose. 

Could lend a charm to royal diadem 

Crowning the brow of some majestic queen, 

Or some exquisite beauty known to fame, 

And by its loveliness of form and sheen 

Put all its fellow jewel-drops to shame! 

A little limpid combination this 

Of two light gases that, perforce, demand 

A union of their two affinities 

Beneath Attraction's ultimate command ; 

And, as within all higher fields of life 

Where harmony and union put a stop 

To that unceasing cosmic urge that flows 

Throughout all Nature in unending strife, 

The union's efflorescence is the drop 

That 'pon the pendant grass-blade clings and 

glows. 
How fragile and ephemeral it seems, 
This little drop that sparkles in the light — 
That immolates itself beneath the beams 
That dry it up and cause it to take flight 
Again, in gaseous form, unseen by eye, — 
By any human sense to apprehend, — 
Back to its lodgment in the clouds on high. 
Where gas joins gas again and doth descend 
In form of rain, or hail, or sleet, or snow. 
Which cleanses all impurities of earth 
[128] 



And makes all living things to bloom and grow 
And reproduce themselves in endless birth. 

Triune in nature — even as is man — 
This thing we know as water takes the form 
Of liquid, solid, gas, as in the plan 
Of life it doth to Nature's laws conform — 
Laws which we cannot even understand. 
But wliich, as constant, we must recognize. 
And 'neath whose strong, invincible command 
Water takes form before our wondering eyes. 
And this would seem, indeed, to act 'neath laws 
Peculiar to itself and it alone. 
For which we seek in vain the final cause 
Of those results which, 'fore our eyes, have shown 
That water takes, at times, a different course 
From other things in nature and is fraught 
With some mysterious power, some hidden force 
That seems to set the common laws at naught. 
For, in al'l else, 'tis recognized that cold 
Contracts, while heat expands — a common rule 
We act upon and teach in every school — 
But in the case of water we behold 
It fails, at times, to exercise its sway 
And, for its own unseen and hidden ends, 
Water pursues, unchecked, its single way 
Beneath some other law to which it bends. 
Like other gaseous liquids it conforms 
Unto the common law of heat and cold, 
But it alone — or almost so, at least, — 
Does so in part and, at a point, reforms 
[129] 



Its latent forces and, with action bold, 
Disowns the common law which now has ceased 
To guide its course and must relax its hold. 
'Neath cold — like others — it, indeed, contracts 
Unto a certain point, the which, when found. 
It hesitates and stops and then reacts 
Upon the law, as though to gain the ground 
It had relinquished in enforced retreat. 
And from this point, obeying the commands 
Of other laws — as, formerly, 'neath heat, — 
It now, 'neath cold, enlarges and expands. 
And so it follows this its signal course 
Till at another given point defined 
Its latent energy exerts its force 
And rends and shatters all that had confined 
Within restraining bonds its stored power — 
This hidden strength which Nature did endower 
And which resists all that attempts to bind. 

What is there in the atom of the gas. 

When hydrogen and oxygen combine. 

That gives such strength that, in a trifling mass, 

A power resides that nothing can confine.'* 

Why is there hidden deep within its breast 

A latent force, obedient to command, — 

The softest and most pliable at rest. 

Yet, stirred, possessing force, unique and grand. 

That naught in nature can repress, restrain — 

That breaks all bounds that would impede its 

course — 
A hidden energy that, here, has lain 
[130] 



Concealing 'neath plasticity its force? 

For let us but confine a little mass 

And freeze within a strong metallic case, 

And we will sense a strength that doth surpass 

All that we know, for, to gain needed space, 

'Twill rip and tear and shatter 'neath its strain 

All that withstands its proud, imperious will 

And, having thus o'ercome, becomes again 

Humble and pliant, tractable and still. 

What action, stored within its calm repose! 

What energy potential in the breast 

Of these the atoms that, its form, compose! 

And yet, how calm and peaceful when at rest ! 

But in its liquid form, or yet as ice. 
It molds the earth beneath its skilful hand — 
Tears down, builds up, or patiently doth slice 
Deep river beds, as with magician's wand ! 
In glacier form it smooths the level plain, 
Or tears the rocky mountain from its base. 
For other force opposes but in vain 
The latent force that water doth encase! 
And yet, upon the other hand, it shows 
A milder side and bends beneath a sway 
(And in full acquiescence ebbs and flows) 
To that dead planet which, in light of day. 
Can but be seen in outline dim and faint 
And yet which — many thousand miles away — 
Confines its tides in orderly restraint. 

And without water such as we can see 
[131] 



Within the jewelled dew-drop's lambent glow, 
Naught could exist, nor life itself could be. 
Nor aught in nature prosper, thrive and grow; 
And what we call the sentient human race 
Had ne'er appeared from lower form below. 
Nor started on its upward climb to trace 
Its halting path, indefinite and slow, — 
Nor had beginning e'en in time or space. 

Thus we can see that, deep within its heart. 
The little dew-drop holds in silent trust 
A mighty secret which it could impart 
Of those great guiding principles that must 
Control the laws that grant to it its force — 
The latent power its molecules contain — 
And 'neath the which it doth pursue a course 
That naught in nature can at all restrain. 
But to the common eye 'tis but a drop 
Of weak and limpid moisture — nothing more — 
And here the common mind is fain to stop, 
Nor seeks its deeper meaning to explore. 
With all our puffed-up pride and pompous show 
How much we miss that's commonplace and rife — 
How little, after all, we really know 
Of these the primal laws that govern life! 
To justify our ignorance we claim 
That tliis, or that, is only known to God — 
Justification impotent and lame 
When we review the path already trod ! 
How much, indeed, that's known to us today 
Was from the eyes of yesterday concealed! 
[132] 



Then who so wise and cunning as to say 
How much of truth remains to be revealed 
To those whose eyes forever search it out, 
In all the phases of the mighty plan, 
And with the open mind, serene, devout. 
Reap the rich harvest Nature offers Man? 



[133] 



WORDS 

What lying use we make, at times, of words ! 
How off, indeed, employ them as a cloak 
Wherewith to hide our feelings from the world ! 

How few give voice to what they truly mean, 
But, using words as rapier and guard. 
Strive to prevent their motives being seen 
And grasped by other mind that might retard 
Some chosen purpose, or attempt to wean 
Our thoughts from something cherished with re- 
gard. 

How man}'^ more use words but as a mask, 
A mummer's mask, in which they play a part 
And strut and swagger 'pon life's daily stage, 
Giving free tongue to sentiment and thought. 
To moral precepts, pure, serene and high. 
With none of which their acts themselves are 

fraught 
And to the which their lives but give the lie! 

And having thus expressed some lofty theme 
That by no other evidence is backed. 
These self-deluded souls in truth would seem 
To think that word can take the place of act, 
And that by giving tongue to lofty phrase 
Their thoughts, their aspirations and their ways 
Straightway acquire what formerly they lacked ! 

[134] 



Words lacking the foundation rock of fact — 

But pale reflections of high thought and deed 

Perchance upon the user may react 

And, in his mind, but generate and breed 

A Aveakened sense of what they represent — 

Delusions, hypocritical and vain. 

That take prospectus for accomplishment — 

Imagined wealth for true and lasting gain ! 

What strange hypnotic sorcery have words 
To pass, with some, as true and legal coin 
^^Hien they are naught indeed but paper gold, 
Nor worth the price of paper e'en itself 
Unless they represent a worthy store 
Of character upbuilt — not empt}'^ creed — 
Of victory o'er self in constant strife — 
True coin of aspiration, thought and deed 
That's minted in the treasury of Life! 



[135] 



INTOLERANCE 

What is there in the heart and soul of Man — 

Deep set within the spirit of Mankind — 

Howe'er 'tis fashioned or where'er it be — 

Or what, indeed, the circumstance involved — 

That makes it rise in opposition to 

The evil spirit of Intolerance? 

What snake-like quality does this possess — 

What hidden venom lurking all unseen — 

That prompts the heart and soul to rise and 

strike 
As we would crush a serpent in the way? 
What is there in such arrogance of mien. 
Of speech, of thought, that — when by others 

seen — 
Calls all our latent forces unto arms 
And whispers to our souls to strike and slay? 
What is the instinct that inspires the call — 
The surge of feeling that our senses thrill — 
And prompts that, on the stake, we wager all 
Ere such Intolerance shall have its will? 
For does not this Intolerance itself 
But indicate a paucity of mind — 
A strange, o'erweening confidence in self — 
Self-centred vision, impotent and blind? 
Why should its weakness not make its appeal 
To sympathetic hearts, benign, refined, — 
Its blindness prompt repugnance to conceal 
Beneath a guise benevolent and kind? 
To many of our human frailties we 
[136] 



Turn understanding eyes — excuse — condone — 
Attempt to justify, or fail to see, 
Or — seeing — recognize them as our own ! 
Not so with this ! Its weakness stirs no heart ! 
Its blindness prompts no sympathy of soul ! 
No milk of human kindness is its part — 
No understanding tolerance its dole ! 
But, deep within us, whispers firm and clear 
A little voice, to which at once the will 
Responds, repeats the summons : " Have no fear ! 
Arise and strike ! And strike, indeed, to kill ! " 
No doubt the answer to the question lies 
But in the fact that weaknesses condoned — 
Those faults 'pon which we cast indulgent eyes — 
Are self-inflicted, suffered and atoned. 
Not so Intolerance which, in its greed 
For power alone, would bold assault direct 
Upon some other mind, which would, indeed. 
But sap and undermine its self-respect. 
A bold, aggressive arrogance that fain 
Would dominate and rule, and still would make 
A dancing puppet of another's brain — 
Its feverish thirst for selfish power to slake. 
Ofl'icious and off'ensive in its aim ; 
Narrow and weak in outlook as in thought ; 
With crude presumptuousness it makes its claim. 
Demanding what, by wiser ones, is sought. 
Insists that others recognize its sway — 
But recognizing ne'er another's right — 
See through its eyes its own, the only, way — 
The only one apparent to its sight ! 
[137] 



A crude, barbaric type of man and mind 
Which evolution must, at last, efface! 
A type, indeed, we should expect to find 
Back in the early childhood of the race! 
Perchance the savage impulse it displays 
To grasp, o'ercome and seize another's part 
Incites the latent instinct that arrays 
All other forces 'gainst it at the start ! 
For soul and mind and body all resent 
Its bold assumption — evident intent 
To bind and hold — and hasten to the fight 
Prepared to die, if need be, for their right ! 



[138] 



PREJUDICE 

'Tis strange to note how human mind doth work 

Within the self-made channels of the brain — 

To watch each tortuous twist and bend and quirk 

Whereby we seek, 'gainst reason, to retain 

Some false and inconsistent stand of thought, 

Lest others — noting change — but come to see 

That, being oft' in contradiction caught. 

We thus admit our fallibility ! 

Take any paper wedded to some cause 

Political, which all its weight has thrown 

Behind some candidate — note how it wars 

'Pon all whose precepts differ from its own! 

Note how it ever strives to justify 

Each act performed, however bad it be, — 

How often, against reason, it doth try 

To prove to all its own consistency ! 

And it which 'gainst such candidate has fought, 

With equal logic, takes the other view — 

Would seem to weigh and measure but find naught 

In what he does that's honest, wise, or true; — 

Forever seeking 'neath it to discern 

Some cause ulterior, some hidden hand, — 

Assuming attitude judicial, stem. 

To prove to all the justice of its stand! 

Thus is such person ever right, or wrong; 

A man of putty, or a man of force; 

But — be he truly weak, or be he strong — 

To these he ne'er assumes a middle course! 

[139] 



Such a position we expect to find 

Among those whom gross ignorance has made 

Unfit to weigh and judge, or in the mind 

Which only by its prejudice is swayed. 

But in our papers, which would undertake 

To mold and guide aright the nation's thought. 

Such petty prejudice as this should make 

All see how more developed minds are caught 

At times within the current of conceit 

And, rather than admit it and retreat. 

They bring, instead, their influence to naught ! 

What is the virus in the human mind 

That ever breeds this dense opacity 

Of vision, turning it myopic, blind. 

And robbing it of all capacity 

To see aught else but what it fain would find — 

Or glimpsing this where it could never be? 

Should blindness such as this attempt to lead 
A nation's thought — to stimulate its brain — 
Or does not such example sow the seed 
Of reasoning that's prejudiced and vain? 
Why praise a man because his politics 
Confonn with ours? Why, otherwise, heap blame 
And prostitute our power to petty tricks 
That no excuse of ignorance can claim? 
Should not the obligation so imposed 
Point out the pure seductiveness of Might 
In any field, and show that eyes, when closed. 
Can ne'er distinguish 'twixt the wrong and right? 
Should we for such consistency e'er strive, 
[14.0] 



Or for some false deduction cherish ruth 
To such extent that we would e'en contrive 
To blind the common vision to the Truth? 
Cannot we see that he who still would grow 
Must be prepared to note when he is wrong, 
And that he only can be counted strong 
Who his own prejudice can overthrow? 



[141] 



CURIOSITY 

" The curiosity of our minds is insatiable. The moment 
a reply is obtained, a fresh question arises." — J. Henri 
Fabre in " The Life of the Caterpillar." 

Does not an active curiosity, 

About all things in nature, indicate 

A true condition of normality — 

A healthful, virile and progressive state 

That fain would use the talents Nature grants 

To rightful purpose, and thereto is fired 

By aspiration to enlarge, enhance 

The little stock of knowledge here acquired? 

Earth life, though wide in range, is short in time 

And, ere we realize, the day is done 

And, at the end, he who aspires to climb 

To greater heights may need the knowledge won 

By patient and persistent effort here — 

The reason strengthened, broadened and refined, 

And so prepared to see distinct and clear 

The purpose of evolving soul and mind ! 

If minds were healthy, would they not e'er crave 
A fuller knowledge of all things that be 
In earthly life, as in eternity. 
And progress from the cradle to the grave 
Be one extended mark of enquiry.'* 
In normal childhood's fresh, enquiring brain 
We see the nature process ever rife — 
The constant effort to collect each grain 
Of knowledge in the harvest field of life ! 
And what are we but children, after all? 
[142] 



How few of Nature's secrets do we grasp 
From out the mighty store that doth appal 
Our little minds that fuller truth would clasp ! 
But, as we grow and concentrate our thought 
In narrow groove — perchance 'pon naught but 

gain — 
The stream of vital energy is caught 
In swirling eddy, and desire doth wane 
For knowledge Mother Nature might have taught. 
But some who've ceased to learn yet strive to teach 
And egotistically prate and preach 
And, puffed with pride, opinions would impress 
'Pon others, when — if honest — they'd confess 
How far true knowledge is beyond their reach ! 
Where'er we find a mind that's ceased to learn — 
That's lost its healthy curiosit}'. 
And that all fuller knowledge e'en would spurn — 
There do we find a true debility. 
An all abnormal state of mind and soul 
Which, by cessation of activity, 
Denotes it functions but in part — not whole ! 



[143] 



"HOLY MATRIMONY" 

A STRANGE example of tradition's sway — 

Of that outgrown, yet binding, mode of thought 

To which we bow — is noticed in the way 

By which, through legal statutes, it is sought 

To hedge and bind by promise, oath and vow, 

Those subtle things that cannot thus be caught 

And which we cannot truthfully avow! 

E'en of the state of matrimony we 
The inner, secret essence fail to find — 
Refuse to look or, looking, fail to see 
That souls' emotions we can never bind — 
That such as these must function full and free 
All uncontrolled by will-power or by mind ! 
'Tis true by these we can dictate our acts — 
May, in some settled course, advance or move. 
But can mere words e'er change or alter facts — 
Can promised vows give birth indeed to love? 
How glibly at the altar do we swear 
To love, to ever honor and obey, — 
Ne'er thinking that we pledge, without a care, 
A something quite beyond our power to sway ! 
Is love a thing to capture and to hold 
At our good pleasure — mortgage, bond, or bill 
That can be signed and sealed — be bought and 

sold — 
By scratch of pen or muttered oath " I will " ? 
Can we grant honor where it is not due, 
Or honor that which can no honor claim? 
[144] 



Can reasoning conscience to itself be true 
And honor such in otherwise than name? 
Obey we may ! But should we e'en attempt 
To keep this vow if ordered to the wrong, 
Thereby incurring our own self-contempt — 
Changing to weakness what, within, was strong? 
Are not these vows — these bindings we would cast 
About tliis holy state — but some outgrown 
And crude survivals of a distant past. 
The which we lack the courage to disown? 
Do not they point to some historic state 
Far in the past when woman, bought and sold 
Like horse or dog, herself chose not her mate 
But went to him with power to seize and hold? 
And e'en her wedding garments — snowy white — 
In ancient times meant naught indeed if not 
The seller's bond, proclaimed to public sight. 
That she was virgin, pure and free from blot! 

Not only in the service but, indeed. 
Within the state itself how much we seem 
But blind adherents to tradition's creed — 
Lip-servers of its forms who never dream 
That, garnering chaff, we quite o'erlook the seed ! 
While vowing love, unending earthly love, — 
A promise quite beyond our power to give — 
What other motives oft' the impulse move — 
How many to their promise truly live? 
Indeed, while vowing love 'fore God and Man, 
How many can in truth the vow proclaim? 
How many seize upon it as a plan 
[145] 



To gain some other goal at which they aim? 

Marriage for wealth, for station, or for power; 

Marriage for ease, for luxury, for greed ; 

All glibly with the name of love we dower 

By blind adherence to an outworn creed ! 

How oft' we hear it said " She married well ! " — 

How seldom that " She married but for love ! " — 

Yet, to ourselves, how seldom dare to tell 

The inference the words themselves would prove! 

" In God's name joined! " we smugly do assert 

Of marriage made for sordid, paltry pelf. 

Nor seem to see that, thereby, we pervert 

And do dishonor to His name itself ! 

Blind hypocrites in action and in thought. 

Who by such cunning sophistries devise 

To gain their ends — secure the object sought — 

And clothe the action in a holy guise! 

How far beneath the common prostitute 
Is she who marries for such sordid goal. 
And who, for ease and wealth, would substitute 
A life-long prostitution of the soul ! 
For she the first, by dire necessity 
Is driven to the act for bread alone! 
But what of her the other? How shall she 
For such base prostitution e'er atone? 
And yet with what contempt she looks upon 
Her poorer sister of the self-same school! 
How with'ringly disdainful is her scorn — 
How rigid and inflexible her rule 
To treat her as a thing not human born, 
[146] 



Though in the ever tragic game of love 

She was, perchance, the victim and the pawn 

Of love itself and, serving him, did prove 

Her power to love — though feeble, weak, forlorn. 

For when indeed we strip the subject clear 

Of all false values, ambiguities 

Of thought and custom, doth it not appear 

That, freed from these and ever-present fear 

Of public censure, naught of worth is found — 

Naught satisfying heart and brain and soul — 

That is not built upon the self-same ground 

And points to love — the one and only goal? 

For what are mumbled mutterings of a priest, 

The promised vow, the statutes of the law. 

The benediction, or the nuptial feast. 

If, in the contract, there exist the flaw 

Of love withheld, of love not freely given, 

The only thing — how often deemed the least ! — 

That registers the act itself in Heaven? 

How worthier far a wedding of the heart, 

Without the benediction of the church, 

Than one with all the forms but still no part 

Of love itself, the which it doth besmirch 

By pharisaic reference thereto — 

Knowing at heart the vow itself untrue! 

Our strong insistence that the vow of love 
Be kept within the ceremonial creeds, 
Howe'er 'tis lacking in the heart and soul. 
Would seem to indicate that from above 
[147] 



Some flash of truth impresses, which we needs 
Must try to grasp, yet, from the mighty whole 
How small a part we do, in truth, retain — 
How much is lost — how little doth remain ! 
How much lip-service takes the place of heart ! 
The letter kept — the law of spirit lost ! 
How, of the two, we choose the lesser part 
And find, too late, that we must pay the cost ! 
For in the state of marriage what exists 
That's holy in itself, or from above. 
That — in its last analysis — consists 
Of aught but what we know, indeed, as Love? 



[148] 



TRUE AFFINITY 

The word Affinity, like that of Sex, 

Has been so much debased in common use — 

So much misused, mishandled and applied 

As cloak wherewith to cover some abuse 

Of Nature's primal law, that but the sound 

Of it but serves to some as an excuse 

To brand the speaker as a victim bound 

To some low concept of the marriage law — 

Some moral pervert, lewd, lascivious, loose 

In mode of thought, who thus doth show the 

flaw 
And 'gainst himself bring evidence profound! 
And yet both words but clearly indicate 
A wond'rous Law and Principle of Life 
Throughout all nature shown, and both relate 
To facts so universal, plain and rife — 
Which for so long we would attempt disown — 
Facts which, perverted, lead to endless strife. 
But, understood, will bring us to our own \ 

Is't not our duty to release our thought 
From such a misconception of the word 
Whose deeper meaning, if but truly sought, 
Will show that True Affinity conferred 
'Pon life is that towards which all Nature strives — 
Whose effort, in our blindness, we've deterred — 
A state with such a wealth of beauty fraught 
'Twould add the crowning lustre to our lives? 
But yet how little is it understood! 
[149] 



How dim our concepts of the law behind 

This universal cosmic urge that would, 

Through this its action, render more refined 

All things in life — upon whatever plane. 

Within whatever kingdom of the plan 

Of Nature's scheme — that thus may be attained 

That growth from protoplasm up to Man ! 

We sense it stirring in impassive stone. 

E'en though our eyes the process fail to see — 

The ceaseless search of atom for its own, 

Moved by the law of True Affinity. 

And ever plainer, more distinct and clear — 

More all apparent to our wondering eyes — 

The plan and process do, indeed, appear 

As kingdom upon kingdom doth arise ! 

Why should we start at mention of the name 

And search at once some unapparent cause, 

Or fear that, b}' its use, we may defame 

Our little, crude and petty man-made laws? 

Is't not far better that we understand. 

Begin to look, and, looking, strive to see 

Whether our acts conform with the command 

Of Nature's primal law — Affinity? 

As Man is triune in his nature, so 

A True Affinity must also be 

Like unto him in this, and, from it, flow 

Three streams — unchecked, unhampered, full and 

free — 
Three strong attractions, on three planes of life 
Which, in conjunction, demonstrate and prove 
[150] 



That harmony — and not eternal strife — 
Is Nature's law — the Law of Perfect Love ! 

The first of these, and the least binding one, 
Is physical in nature, and when we 
Have felt its force we have but just begun 
To test the law of True Affinity; — 
And yet how many lives are wrecked upon 
Its rocky banks 'tis evident to see ! 
Though greatly more refined and grown in force. 
In power, in strength, can we, indeed, refute 
Its origin, or fail to see its source 
Is found within the kingdom of the brute? 
Whate'er refinements it has gained in this — 
Howe'er the statement may inspire our ruth — 
Is it not better that we face the fact 
And cease to turn our eyes away from truth? 
E'en the persistence must at last prove vain 
And we must see attraction physical 
Has come to us from out a lower plane 
And is a legacy from animal ! 
And yet how many never seem to grasp 
This simple fact and, by but beauty led, 
Wonder why happiness eludes their clasp — 
Why love grows listless — soon is cold and dead ! 
Beauty may serve in life's full, ardent youth 
To bind and hold, and, life itself, to dower 
With seeming happiness, but what, forsooth, 
Remains when youth has faded like a flower — 
When beauty which had made youth's senses 
rage — 

[151] 



Which, chained to its triumphal car, had led 
The mind and heart — at last gives place to age 
And vieAvs the dismal prospect spread ahead? 
Here, 'pon the stream of physical desire, 
Its barque lies drifting, with no power to check 
Its helpless course, and they who would aspire 
To nothing more must watch the final wreck 
Of all youth's hopes and aspirations high — 
Youth's dreams of happiness now spent and 

flown — 
And pay the final forfeit with a sigh, 
As life drags out its weary way — alone ! 

The second stream of this triumvirate 
Of latent forces in Affinity 

Which guides our course, more closely doth relate 
Sense unto sense and shows how much may be 
Saved from the wreck if, to the physical 
Attraction, there be added something more — 
A something closer to the spiritual — 
A bond that reaches nearer to the core 
Of life itself, conditions taste with taste. 
And, by a mutual reciprocity 
Of sense and feeling, doth provide a store 
Of common likes and dislikes, saving waste 
And leading to a fuller harmony. 
Mutual tastes within the fields of Thought, 
Of Art, of Nature — common purposes, 
Ambitions and desires together sought — 
All which, in their sum total, do possess 
Powerful bonds that draw and bind and hold 
[152] 



Two hearts together after youth's hot rage 
Lies far behind and the advancing cold 
Portends the disillusion of old age. 

But, more than this, the stream of higher 

thought — 
When life o'er youth's insurgent tide, has passed — 
Possesses bonds more binding still — more fraught 
With those, the higher qualities that last 
Throughout all life, bearing life's daily strain — 
Where — merged together — present, future, 

past. 
With common purpose, strive but to attain 
A greater harmony, accord and peace. 
In the advance towards that far-shining goal 
Where, in a full concordance, strife must cease 
And soul respond, as one, to other soul. 
Here in the field of Reason and of INIind — 
Of common ethical pursuit and aim, 
Mutual standards both of thought and life — 
A far more lasting partnership we find 
Than either of the other two can claim — 
A bond that supersedes that petty strife, 
That clash of will 'pon will and thought 'pon 

thought — 
Ensnaring folds, so prevalent and rife, 
Within whose meshes many lives are caught. 
For here, within the region of the mind. 
The soul must rule and all within us is, 
By it, to finer subtleties refined 
Which rise above such crude discordancies. 
[153] 



If, of these bonds, but one alone we choose, 
'Tis better far we choose the one of soul 
Than that of body, even though we lose 
That part of life which some but deem the whole — 
That fire and passion, that unceasing urge 
That stirs the blood, and, coursing through the 

vein, 
Drowns all within its wild, exultant surge. 
And breaks all banks that would its course re- 
strain. 
For this torrential flood will lose its force 
In time, and — once its passion spent and dead — 
Must wind through life its dull and listless course 
With nothing to look forward to ahead. 
No doubt the ill repute with which we see 
The word is clothed is but because in thought. 
If not in speech, we use Affinity 
As though with sensuality but fraught. 
But this mistake is ours and we should strive 
To weed this false assumption from the mind 
And, having done so, earnestly contrive 
To learn the lessons we, indeed, can find 
By keener, closer study of the plan 
Whereby all things in Nature are refined 
By this same law which, everj'where, we see 
Working on all from atom up to Man — 
This wond'rous law of True Affinity ! 
And, being triune in our nature, should 
Not we grant freedom upon every plane 
And from each field of life extract the good, 
But taking due precaution to restrain 
[154] 



All acts that controvert true Nature's laws — 

That point not ever to the distant goal 

Now plain in sight, and which develop flaws 

Within the armor of our self-control? 

All powers we have were given us for use — 

To use aright or, otherwise, retard 

Our progress here — therefore, against abuse 

Of these same powers we must be on our guard. 

And ever see that every attribute 

Which, sensed aright, must work constructively. 

Is not so misapplied as to refute 

True Nature's law and act destructively! 

Should not a True Affinity command 

A proper function, on each sep'rate plane. 

Of all our powers, but keeping well in hand 

And ever ready to repress, restrain 

Through will, all that denies the sovereign brain, 

Or bows not to its ultimate demand? 

And, as the flesh is lower than the soul — 

As are the senses — is it not but right 

That, of the three, the highest have control 

And lead the others in the upward fight 

Towards final happiness — that distant goal 

Which, even here, 'tis possible to see — 

And which, within our souls, doth shed its light 

And show that, at the end, in perfect whole 

Part joins with part in True Affinity? 



[155] 



TRUE DIVORCE 

How we misread the lesson Nature shows 
Throughout all life — in animal, in plant 
And even in the atoms of the stone — 
The true inwardness of which forever glows 
Though we see not and still, with eyes aslant 
'Pon some conceived ideal of our own, 
Eight 'gainst the stream that still must bear us on 
Upon the flowing current of its tide. 
Priding ourselves at times that we have won 
When oft' our gain, when all is said and done, 
Is but a paltry pittance to our pride! 

A pride in that we have upheld the law 

Of pure convention — man-made, man-imposed — 

Which we have worshipped as a golden calf, 

And in so doing tried to pick some flaw 

In Nature's way, or kept our eyelids closed 

To what she offers in our own behalf 

E'en more than in the kingdoms just below ; 

And which, had we the intellect to find, 

Would show to what a height we, here, may 

grow — 
The fuller compensations which would flow 
From fuller understanding of the mind. 

Where'er we look in Nature we must see 
That she pursues her own consistent way ; 
That life is fashioned with a single tool ; 
In her domain but one august decree: 
[156] 



" Attraction must forever be my sway 

And harmony the essence of my rule ! " 

" Two human bonds alone can be of use ; 

These bonds must be the conscience and the heart ; 

Where these attract, I bind — the rest I loose ; 

For naught is gained, nor purpose, nor excuse 

For holding that that's bound alone in part ! " 

Whate'er the state or the relation be — 
The tie of blood, the matrimonial band, 
Which we oft' stamp with false divinity — 
Those souls are unattached, distinct and free. 
That yield not to the ultimate command 
Of heart and mind in welded unit}^ ! 
We dimly sense the truth when we avow 
That friendship is the highest of them all, 
For it is bound not with a promised vow. 
Or ties of blood — it only can allow 
Full acquiescence to the nature call. ■ 

But, by our lives, how often we insist 
That spirit is inferior to word — 
That rule, convention, statute represent 
The thing itself, and, doing so, resist 
The gains that could upon us be conferred 
Did not we thus block the accomplishment. 
How often do we see the wedded pair. 
With hearts and minds unmatched and unagreed, 
Drag through existence desolate and bare — 
Through soul starvation quite beyond compare — 
Because convention thus has so decreed? 
[157] 



We fear convention's frown — so-called disgrace, 

As though disgrace lies in a wrong repaired 

More fully than within a wrong sustained ! 

We call him weak who would the error face — 

Deem moral obloquy is his who dared 

To see that thus no higher good is gained ! 

'Tis rather true perversion and disgrace — 

Real harlotry of body, soul and mind — 

To thus, in such an empty form, encase 

And with the blessings of the church to grace 

A hollow bond that still can never bind! 

Can we the law of Nature thus defy 

And prostitute to bigotry and creed 

As though it were, indeed, a thing of naught? — 

A crime that to high heaven itself should cry 

And, deep within our souls, will surely breed 

The bastard offspring of pei*verted thought ! 

But yet by surface harmony some try 

To hide the discord that their lives contain 

And, rather than convention's forms defy, 

They play a part and act through life a lie 

And, dying, think they've registered a gain! 

What misconception this of Nature's plan ! 
What loss to lives that otherwise might bear 
A fuller, richer harvest to the soul ! 
For if no obligation prove a ban — 
Duty to others still within our care — 
How paltry, futile seems indeed the goal ! 
Why should the whited sepulchre appear 
[158] 



So all-important to the human eye 
Which fails to see, beneath, the chill and drear 
Collected bones — the skeletons that leer 
Beneath the coating under which they lie? 

Why not show honesty in this as well 

As in so many minor things of life? 

Why, without cause, increase the human woes? 

Why, for the sake of form, insist to dwell 

Within an atmosphere of constant strife 

Rather than the initial fault disclose? 

Are lives ennobled by such lasting strain? 

Are thus the gifts of bounteous Nature heaped 

The outlay compensated for by gain — 

Or are not rather such lives lived in vain 

Where discord is the harvest that is reaped? 



[159] 



SEX 

How passing strange the ways of mortal mind ! 

How oft' self-blinded, ignorant and crude ! 

At times so prudish that we e'en must find 

A something low, debasing, mean and rude 

In Nature's laws themselves — in her own way 

And mode of action — showing how a lewd 

Conception can our better thought betray 

And breed therefrom a gross, lascivious brood ! 

And, in our foolish prudery of thought. 

Which, for debased mind, is but excuse. 

Some words are with licentious meaning fraught 

Wliich quite debars them from a common use. 

No matter how important in themselves — 

How inconvenient to attempt to breach 

The gap without, they're placed 'pon topmost 

shelves 
Within the mind — far, far beyond our reach ! 

'Tis so with " Sex " — a word that our own 

thought 
Has so contaminated that 'tis sought 
To bar the lessons it could surely teach. 
And e'en to drive it from the common speech! 
Though playing in our lives as great a part 
As anything in life, we seem to find 
That this — controlling mind and soul and 

heart — 
Is, to our sensitiveness — unrefined ! 
How much disease such sensitiveness shows 
[160] 



And how insensitive to higher thought ! 

How parrot-like the reasoning we'd oppose 

To one who for the hidden reason sought ! 

Thus in our prudish folly we'd ignore 

A fundamental principle of life ; 

Refuse to see or, seeing, but deplore 

That Sex exists and is forever rife 

Within us all — e'en to the inmost core ! 

Our delicacy is so great that we 

Blush with confusion at the very name. 

And look upon as crude, unmannered, he 

Who cannot recognize its depths of shame 

But claims that shame — if shame indeed there 

be — 
Is not in it, but ours alone the blame ! 
No doubt these words themselves to many seem 
Indicative of a perverted mind. 
And many, from this evidence, would deem 
The writer of them coarse and unrefined ! 

We lie unto our children of the cause 
Of this their advent to this world of ours — 
Make no attempt to train them in the laws 
Of life, or indicate the hidden powers 
That with each mortal soul are placed in trust. 
But leave them helpless victims to blind chance, 
To sin, disease and vice, consuming lust — 
That we our prudishness may but enhance! 
And then we wonder that they go astray! 
Are seized with horror, fear, compassion, ruth — 
Cast up our eyes, exhort, beseech and pray 
[161] 



That from their evil ways they turn, forsooth ! 

And ne'er a moment to our conscience lay 

The thought that what had saved them was — the 

truth ! 
The truth, the which they had the right to know ! 
The truth, without the which they ne'er could be 
So well prepared and armed as to o'erthrow 
All those seductive obstacles which we 
But knew too well would 'cross their pathway throw 
Entangling vines, so bright and fair to see! 

Of all relationships in life is there 
Another so unselfish, pure and good — 
So spirit-like, so radiant and so fair — 
As this, the crowning glory — Motherhood ? 
Should any state command so great respect. 
Be more esteemed, or have less cause for blame? 
And yet e'en this, if we will but reflect. 
To prudery is, in itself, a shame! 
And she who carries close beneath her heart 
A little human soul must never show 
Herself in public lest the prudes should dart 
Contemptuous glances at her as they go ! 
Can thoughtless folly any further reach? 
Can prurient mind to deeper depths descend? 
And should not this a vital lesson teach. 
And cause us rise at once and put an end 
To such a low, lascivious mode of thought — 
To such a standard of the heart and mind — 
That e'en to holy motherhood has sought 
Some slimy shreds of shamefulness to bind? 
[162] 



And these but an example of the ways 

Of thought that prudishness will but prepare — 

That ever seeks to lower, ne'er to raise, 

And bring contempt 'pon what should be most 

fair. 
And by ignoring do we think that we 
Can blot out Sex — can interrupt her sway — 
Can from her strong encircling bonds be free. 
And bring to naught our Mother Nature's way 
Of life itself? As well we might attempt 
To stop our flight through space — as well essay 
From gravitation's law to prove exempt. 
Or change to darkest night the light of day ! 
For Sex is but the principle of life 
That stirs in every animal and tree — 
In every kingdom dominant and rife — 
Pulsing throughout all nature full and free! 
And in the atoms of the rock concealed — 
As in the forms of higher life revealed — 
It ever works, though we refuse to see. 
As the hand-maiden of Affinity ! 
Affinity, that law of perfect love — 
That law which, over all, exerts its sway — 
That law of life by which we live and move — 
That law which all things living must obey ! 

For Sex reveals alone that primal law 
Of constant growth which, throughout life re- 
plete. 
Makes Active ever to the Passive draw — 
The Positive the Negative to greet ! 
[163] 



And whether it be shown in flinty rock, 

In vegetation, animal, or man, 

'Tis all the same and in its breast doth lock 

The inner purpose and the hidden plan 

Of Nature's self, by which we live and grow. 

Advance, progress, and — doing so — refine 

The body, mind and soul she did bestow 

To something more approaching the divine! 

And is't not paradoxical that we 

In scheme so high can naught but baseness find 

That in this great refining plan we see 

A something low, ignoble — unrefined? 

And who shall say that Sex is but a rude 
Device alone assuring constant birth? 
A temporary scheme that brood 'pon brood 
May follow on and populate the earth; 
A thing but physical — a passing phase 
That, with the body's death, itself must die — 
A form ephemeral that ne'er can raise 
Itself to other forms of life more high — 
More pure and subtle, spirit-like, refined. 
Which, leaving body, chooses as its goal 
The action and attraction mind 'pon mind — 
The Sex Appeal of soul to other soul! 



[164] 



BIRTH CONTROL 

How strangely blinded we remain to facts 
That seem apparent to so many eyes ! 
How oft' the forward-moving mind reacts 
And, in reaction, treats but with surprise 
And condemnation those that look ahead 
And see some things unseen by common view, — 
Who in unbiased search for truth are led. 
And would discard all that appears untrue ! 
How much we rail at them and try to throw 
Some crude aspersion on their thoughts and 

aims — 
How often, in our charges, sink to low 
And petty suppositions of their claims — 
And how much pride we take in our own stand. 
In our oAvn blindness, our own pygmy size 
And breadth of outlook, that we thus demand 
That others see all things through our own eyes ! 

Thus do we look with horror and distrust 
'Pon those who see in orderly control 
Of birth a weapon 'gainst both crime and lust, 
'Gainst poverty and sickness and the whole 
Brood of such evils, that take much from life 
Of happiness and pleasure, bringing pain — 
Supplanting harmony with endless strife. 
And showing loss where life should show a gain ! 
Perhaps the visionaries err in that 
They claim too much, and yet, indeed, perchance 
They see a vision of a better state 
[165] 



That has, so far, escaped the common glance — 
A naked truth, the which the}^ strive to clasp, 
Which, though approaching, ever keeps away — 
A truth which ever will elude our grasp 
While we deem ours the one and only Avay ! 

And so we frown on all control of birth 

And, in the words of phallic priest of old. 

We say : " Be fruitful ! Populate the earth ! " 

And few so far enlightened, or so bold. 

As to point out that health and strength of mind 

Are more important, and that needless graves 

Are quickly filled where these are undermined, — 

Or ask: " Why breed at all a race of slaves? " 

What is the dictate that would urge us bring 

A little soul to loAv, or stunted, life — 

To give it birth and then, indeed, to fling 

It, unprepared, into incessant strife 

With evil forces it can ne'er withstand — 

Midst cruel vices it must e'er obey, 

With none near by to lend a helping hand. 

Or e'en to point it to the proper way? 

Why populate the earth Avith further ills — 

Why multiply the criminal desire — 

While what we have already fully fills 

Our institutions, if we but aspire 

To higher planes of life and act and thought — 

Those more consistent with the higher plan — 

That may be found if diligently sought — 

Which Nature holds in custody for Man? 

[166] 



And should not each one for himself decide — 

If he be free from flaw or moral blight — 

Whether he chooses to become the guide, 

And feels that he is fit to guide aright 

Some little soul entrusted to his care — 

For whom an obligation he assumes — 

And who, beneath his guidance, — ill or fair — 

Sinks down, or rises up and buds and blooms ? 

'Twould seem that he's entitled to the choice — 

That none but he can just decision make — 

That his should be the one deciding voice 

If such responsibility he take ! 

And, if he choose not, who can say him nay — 

Who authorized to try but to begrime 

His purposes, or to attempt to lay 

Against his liberty the charge of crime? 

But, in an atavistic relapse, we 
In mode of thought jump back to ancient days 
And, in such birth control, appear to see 
A devil, working strange and diverse ways 
Which no right-thinking man has ever trod. 
And, with our minds wrapped in a mental haze. 
Deem he attacks the primal Law of God ! 
A modern mode of antiquated thought 
That, in a phallic worship, has its ground — 
A crude survival, through the ages brought, — 
A fitting study for some sage profound, 
Versed in the ways of psychologic lore, 
Wlio, if he could but trace its winding course 
And reach unto its hidden inmost core, 
[167] 



Would find that here, indeed, it had its source ! 
What grip these ancient precepts have to hold — 
How firm their grasp upon the heart and mind — 
How often in what seems the new, the old. 
If but we dig, we will most surely find ! 

Is't not far better that we leave to fate — 
Fate led by conscience and by reason taught, 
Where neither crime nor illness do dictate — 
The births which are but right when duly sought ? 
Why should we strive to force against the will 
And, by our legal statutes, regulate 
A nature-impulse such as this until 
We ope' our eyes to find it is too late — 
Too late to save from suffering and pain 
The helpless souls which, to the wolves, we toss — 
The myriad births Avhich were, indeed, but vain 
And represent not gain, but utter loss? 
If those that come, we would attempt to guard, 
And were prepared to nourish and to save. 
Perchance, in part at least, we might retard 
The fatal yearly harvest of the grave! 

But no ! Our prudish folly fails to see 
That we approach the matter from behind. 
So, from the thought of birth-control, we flee 
And, firmer 'pon our minds, attempt to bind 
Those out-grown precepts of antiquity — 
Self-righteous, deaf, intolerant and blind ! 
And when one has the courage to protest 
And teach a wiser law, we call him low, — 
[168] 



Frown down upon him, threaten with arrest, 
Or, like a culprit, into prison throw ! 
Of virile countries ours the last would seem 
To sense the error of its present stand 
And, doctrine-ridden, sunken in a dream, 
We still obey the ignorant command 
Of phallic priests, far in the distant past. 
And, 'gainst all thought and reason, would de- 
mand 
That this, the youngest, most progressive land 
Must, in a change of thought, but prove the last ! 

But others see — where sight, to us, is hid 

In crude adherence to an ancient time — 

That, by a fuller knowledge, they may rid 

Themselves of much of ignorance and crime — 

May meet the issues of the present day 

And add to life's short span a greater length — 

May make their people's life investment pay 

A fuller revenue of health and strength ! 

In death — not birth — the time solution lies ! 

And this the more enlightened clearly see 

And set before them as the vital prize 

The wise reduction of mortality 

That saps the infant life of many lands 

And, from the pain and labor of the womb, 

A number, countless as the drifting sands. 

Yields a rich harvest only for the tomb ! 

Must we expect perfection in all change? 
Suppose some few do, by their acts, abuse 
[169] 



A fuller liberty, a wider range, 

Can this alone, and of itself, excuse 

Such bold curtailment of intrinsic right 

That is inherent in each living soul — 

A gift from Nature's self for which to fight. 

Nor brook abridgment — either part or whole? 

Why should not law prescribe what we should eat, 

Lest, failing to, we meet untimely end? — 

A finish which would seem both just and meet 

If towards perversion these same actions tend ! 

Yet where ill-health and death are brought by one. 

The other must supply a thousand-fold — 

A fact apparent, which we blindly shun. 

Nor try to learn the lesson it doth hold ! 

What Pharisees we are, indeed, in thought — 

How thoughtless, inconsistent, crude and wild — 

How oft' within the mesh of habit caught — 

How easily, by fallacies, beguiled ! 

Would not, indeed, responsibility 

We rightly hold — nor can, by statute, shun — 

Develop in us an ability 

To hold the place that we, in truth, have won — 

The obligation that each entity 

Holds unto self and others — which no one 

But he can meet in its entirety? 

And if we would attempt to bind the soul 
In this the field of ethical desire. 
Where moral obligations rule the mind, 
Why be content, indeed, without the whole? 
[170] 



Why not go further still? Why not aspire 

All thought and action, 'neath our rule, to bind? 

Why not subject religion to our sway 

And legislate the path that should be trod 

And, by a legal statute, show the way 

In which to offer praises to our God? 

'Tis not by such paternalism we 

Approach more nearly to the distant goal ! 

'Tis not by binding that which should be free 

We cast the shackles from the mind and soul — 

Nor is it by a blind perversity 

We solve the weighty problem. Birth Control ! 



[171] 



THE NEW, BUT ANCIENT, STRIFE 

How strange it is to note in modern times 
Those same reactions, inhibitions, doubts — 
Those forward moves, offset by backward steps, — 
That childish clinging to the ancient way 
Of thought and act — that blind conservatism 
That binds our minds to crude tradition's sway 
As firmly now as in a former day ! 

How curious to see how hard we fight 

All true advance of heart and soul and brain — 

How often we oppose with all our might 

The forward step and strive but to retain 

The thought and custom of an age gone by, 

Whose cause and purpose we have now outgrown, 

E'en if, before, 'twere right, and vainly try 

To chain the present to a past now flown 

Adown the misty path of distant time — 

Rude stepping stones that mark the halting way 

By which evolving man did slowly climb. 

With tedious steps, unto the light of day ! 

The page of history distinctly shows 
'Twas ever thus ! No doubt 'twill ever be — 
At least till man to fuller stature grows 
And casts the scales that will permit him see 
That as man grows so soul itself must grow — 
That naught for which our thought should cher- 
ish ruth 
Will, in true progress, meet with overthrow 
[172] 



Before the slow advancing march of Truth! 
And so the world, divided in two bands, 
Fights for, or 'gainst, the freedom of a sex, 
And in all forward-moving, virile lands 
A moral battle rages that doth vex. 
Harass, disturb the normal trend of life. 
The calm complacence of accepted way, 
That mournfully bewails the wordy strife 
In blind adherence to an early day. 

But no advance on earth was ever gained 
Than by such means, and even liberty 
Such as we know had never been attained 
And bondage, serfdom, still had been had we 
The slow momentum of advance restrained. 
And those who fight for liberty must e'er 
Be branded as base traitors to the cause 
Of now-accepted thought — must ever bear 
The burden of iconoclasts 'neath laws 
That ever would preserve the status quo — 
Laws made by those who ever look askance 
'Pon any change, nor see that ebb and flow 
But indicate the method of Advance. 

Again I say it ever has been so — 

And ever so we may expect to find 

That, 'gainst opposing force, alone we grow 

To higher standards of the heart and mind! 

Two thousand years ago the man who taught 
A truer message than Hebraic law 
[173] 



Itself contained, was, as a victim, brought 
And sacrificed to that o'ermastering awe 
For institutions as they now exist — 
That Wind adherence to accepted way 
That gives reaction birth and would resist. 
Oppose, retard, postpone, divert, delay 
The full dispersal of that mental mist 
Beneath the light of Truth's absorbing ray. 

And so because, as yet, she has not shown. 
Sufficient strength to force us grant her claim 
For that which, without pressure, we should 

own 
Is but her due, we, with but logic lame. 
Attempt to show she is not fit to know 
Her mind itself — that femininity, 
With all the many graces it may show, 
Yet lacks that spark of true divinity 
That marks the reasoning, self-conscious soul 
From all the lower kingdoms of the plan 
And that the power to glimpse the higher goal 
Is one, indeed, monopolized by man ! 

What sophistry such argument would seem ! 
Why not its utter groundlessness confess ? 
How inconsistent even with a gleam 
Of that divinity he doth profess ! 

And some — among them those we should expect 
To take a higher ground in such a cause — 
Oppose her franchise, would her claim reject 
[174] 



And rule it out of court, forsooth, because 

'Twould not, perchance, affect the net result 

And add but to the national expense — 

(A thing, 'bove others, that we most consult) — 

Or bring to man himself no recompense 

Consistent with concessions he must make. 

Or for such fuller liberty atone — 

Her liberty ! — a right which he did take 

And now withholds by might — and might alone ! 

'Tis not a question of expediency. 

Nor one of cost, but one of Moral Right 

And that alone, but yet how many see? 

And do not try to dim their moral sight 

By this, or that, excuse of little force. 

By sophistry, or logic weak and vain. 

And think, by doing so, they check the course 

Of thought's advance, or e'en its stream retain 

Within those ancient banks revered of old. 

But which — grown weak and crumbling now — 

we find 
No longer can withstand the free and bold 
And ever rising current of the mind. 

Some claim that, by the statutes of the land, 
The franchise is alone the recompense 
Of him who, with a rifle in his hand. 
Stands ever ready in her just defense; 
But, in the state of war, must any bear 
The burden that must fall on womankind — 
Can all that man can offer e'er compare 
[175] 



With this which is, indeed, her sex's share? — 
Then why to such a pregnant fact be Wind? 

And do we take the ballot from the man 

Who fails to bear his part against the foe, 

Or yet disfranchise, 'neath our present plan, 

The one who is too old, or weak, to go ? 

False logic — nothing more — such claims as 

these ; 
Pure sophistry, by which we would withhold 
Another's right — a right which we did seize 
By brutal strength, back in the days of old 
When woman was a slave, — a thing of naught — 
At best a plaything for his lustful mood — 
A victim, in a time remote and rude. 
Of slavery — a state which man has sought 
To ever bind upon her with firm hold ! 

" A woman's place is in the home," they sa}', 
And, in so saying, atavistic mind 
Treads the time-honored path of ancient day 
When woman in the harem was confined; 
And, in our fancy's flight, as in a dream. 
We see her 'neath her lord and master cower — 
A pretty bauble floating on life's stream — 
A toy to while away a passing hour ! 

Her place is in the home in very truth, 
As man's is in the office, or the field. 
And here, perchance, her labors are, forsooth, 
As great as his, if not so plain' revealed; 
[176] 



But is the home the compass of her Hfe — 
The sum and substance of her mind and soul — 
Has woman — be she widow, maid, or wife — 
No aspiration other than this goal? 

And even in the families of those 
Who raise most loudly this insistent call 
Are we, indeed, expected to suppose 
Their womenfolk find here their all-in-all, 
The full sum-total of their hearts' desire 
And ne'er, without its boundaries, would find 
Some other goal to which they would aspire — 
Some broader prospect for the growing mind? 

Some such there may be — and 'tis well they're few 

With such slow, unimaginative brain. 

Such slaves of habit Avho — if good and true — 

Show by this fact alone that they retain 

But little aspiration to advance, 

Or heed the active mind's insistent claims, 

But find in dull and common circumstance 

Full satisfaction for their lowly aims. 

But still man strains with fervor to his heart 
The blind delusion that the home alone 
Is woman's proper place, the better part 
Of life, and can for other loss atone, 
E'en while, each day, the evidence of sight — 
The overwhelming evidence of brain — 
But shows that, from his eyes, he hides the light 
By this delusion, outgrown, false and vain. 
[177] 



Thus, bj refusing to admit that she 
Can in the paths of higher thought be led, 
He does his part, in blind perversity, 
To turn her stream of energy, instead. 
Into the petty channel of display. 
Extravagance of ornament, or dress. 
While, all unthinking, man pursues his way 
Beneath the growing burden, nor doth guess 
That all the energy and thought displayed 
In something so ephemeral and vain 
Could, w4th a little wisdom, be conveyed 
In other course, and used to higher gain. 

To some their womenkind are but the shield 
'Pon which they would display their wealth and 

might — 
The tent-pole of the savage that doth yield 
The scalp-locks gathered in the bloody fight ! 

And while he grants the franchise to the blacks. 
From whom the slavish shackles are but cast. 
And to the pauper immigrant, he lacks — 
Because of blind adherence to the past — 
The courage, or the insight, to admit 
That e'en the most advanced of womankind — 
His mother, wife, or sister — is no whit 
The less entitled to the use of mind, 
Or exercise of preference of thought. 
In formulating statutes that must bind 
'Pon both alike, though man, indeed, has sought 
To show that this, to him, should be confined ! 
[178] 



How crude the insult this would, thus, imply — 

A slur 'pon mother, sister, wife, or child! 

An injury that woman should defy. 

Nor let herself be otherwise beguiled 

From taking, here and now, a firmer stand 

And making to all men upon the earth 

Due requisition, positive demand. 

For rights that are intrinsic with her birth! 

A claim inherent as the right of man — 

No benefit, the which he may alloAv, — 

Naught but her common birthright which he can, 

In common justice, never disavow 

Howe'er he strives with sophistry to blind 

His eyes unto the justice of her cause 

And, granting to her nothing, still would bind 

And hold her subject to his man-made laws! 

Expediency has naught, indeed, to do 

With matters in the moral field of life ! 

In ethics, only what is just and true 

Should carry weight, for, in the final strife 

Of justice 'gainst injustice, right 'gainst wrong, 

The wreath of victor in the bloody fight 

Will go not to the arrogant and strong 

But him who stood for justice and the right! 



[179] 



THE METAMORPHOSIS OF CHARITY 

Did'st ever note the attitude assumed 

Towards charity by different types of mind — 

Which attitude provides a measure gauge 

That shows the true advance each soul has made 

From selfishness towards true philanthropy? — 

From narrow service only unto self, 

That deems expenditure in larger cause 

Akin to loss, unto that other goal 

Where service to mankind appeals to soul 

As one of Nature's fundamental laws. 

The soul that has not greatly thus progressed 
Deems charity an imposition 'pon 
The one who has to affluence attained ; — 
A tax upon superiority. 
Which this same affluence would indicate, 
If not prove 'yond the shadow of a doubt. 
All men, he oft' and loud is heard to claim, 
Have equal opportunities to wealth ; 
Have the same chance to what he calls " success " ; 
Which, if they fail to grasp, would seem to show 
A fatal lack of energy in them, 
For which it seems unfair he should be taxed. 
So he in self-sufficiency assumes 
That he but earns the just and true reward 
Of greater strength of spirit, or of mind. 
Nor grants to favored opportunity — 
To accident of time, or place, or birth. 
To special gifts that Nature has endowed — 
[180] 



A share in his attainment of success. 

But should such gifts be used to selfish end? — 

Should power of acquisition, or the keen 

Ability to glimpse a future gain, 

Entitle such a one to work his will 

And pile up wealth he cannot rightly use 

More than it justifies the strong of arm 

To take that which the weak cannot defend? 

But questions such as these but bring a frown 

Unto the brow of him possessed of wealth 

And words of scorn start from his ready lips, 

With which he would attempt to drown the 

thought 
Of what he scornfully calls " socialism " — 
A word which, to him, bears an evil taint 
Of slothfulness encouraged, if not taught ; 
Of energy suppressed beneath restraint; 
Ambition curbed and impulse brought to naught. 
But such as he e'er jump to the extreme 
In ways of thought and, deeming this unsound. 
Fight any change proposed, nor seem to dream 
That here, as ever, Truth takes middle ground ; — 
That all desired is equal chance for all 
To life, to liberty, to happiness. 
Without regard to special chance, or gift 
That grants to one what he can ne'er use well 
And, in so doing, takes from many more 
The modicum that, happiness, may spell. 
But there's a limit to the use of wealth 
For selfish ends, the which — if we transgress 
The rule — would seem to undermine the health 
[181] 



Of soul itself and bring unhappiness. 
But this the thoughtless never seems to see, 
But deems he is imposed upon by those 
Who from his surplusage crave charity 
Wherewith to help assuage another's woes. 

A little further on the road that leads 
Unto the final, altruistic goal. 
We find the thought of imposition wanes 
And charity is looked upon instead 
More as a nuisance we must bear withal — 
A thing to be avoided if we can. 
As we would 'scape a sickness, or a plague, 
But which — if we cannot indeed elude — 
We should discharge as cheap as possible. 
And they at this stage ever would insist 
That in return therefor be granted them 
A full and heaping measuref ul of praise — 
A credit which the world at large may see — 
Without the which they feel they have but lost 
The capital invested in the cause ; 
And so for every ounce to charity 
Thus given, they would ask a pound's return 
In recognition by the world at large. 
That with the salve of self-complacency 
They may allay the pain when others learn 
How they would thus an unmade debt discharge! 
But what avails the charity that gives 
A pittance from the fullness of its store 
To him that in dire destitution lives. 
The which, indeed, has cost it nothing more 
[182] 



Than but a moment's thought, and is not made 
At cost of some real sacrifice to self ; 
Which charity's foundations have not laid — 
A paltry offering alone of pelf 
Which, in its name, doth charity evade? 

A little further still upon the road 

We see it from another point of view 

And, as an obligation, it doth goad 

Which, if to higher self we would be true. 

We cannot 'scape, elude, or brush aside 

As no affair of ours, or treat as toll 

Imposed unjustly, and, here, petty pride 

Is not the aim — but ease of mind and soul. 

For here indeed we come at last to see 

That each must bear the portion of the weight 

His strength permits and that true charity 

Must strive a common evil to abate. 

And here at first we come to realize 

That we our brother's keeper are indeed — 

A fact to which, before, we closed our eyes. 

Nor even dimly sensed that this must lead 

To higher standards of the mind and soul 

In this our progress towards the final goal. 

Thus are the scales that dimmed our moral sight 

At last cast off and we begin to see 

The slowly mounting glow of radiant light 

That heralds dawn of a true charity ! 

But on the last stage of the journey we 
View charity beneath the morning glow 
[183] 



Of a developed, true philanthopy — 

Pure, altruistic light that now doth throw 

Into a bold relief another's claim 

To his due share of happiness and joy, 

The which to help secure we must employ 

Our earnest effort and make this our aim — 

Our constant purpose and our shining goal — 

The helping to a fuller liberty 

Of some, perchance down-trodden, human soul 

That here has failed to fare as well as we. 

And now no thought of obligation lies 

Upon the heart and soul, but in its place 

The beauteous bud of privilege doth grow, 

Which, come to flower, will ever draw our 

eyes 
Away from self and with its charm must grace 
True charity that from the heart doth flow. 
For, here, wealth means to us but little moi'e 
Than opportunity at our command 
To help those not so blessed — a heaping store 
Wherefrom to lend a ready, helping hand 
To him who, bowed beneath life's heavy load, 
With faltering step and palpitating breath. 
Traces his dreary course along the road 
That shows no hope but through the door of 

death. 
How little can those, back upon the way, 
Sense all the joys that herein dormant lie — 
How faintly doth their selfish thought portray 
The rich rewards that a true charity 
Brings him who strives for other than for self — 
[184] 



Who to the cause even his life would pledge 
And, scorning power and place and pomp and 

pelf, 
Deems charity his greatest privilege! 



[185] 



THE MODERN MAN WITH THE 
MUCK-RAKE 

How little could the artist realize 
The form and color, subtle tones and hues 
That Nature spreads with such a lavish hand 
Upon her canvas, painted new each day. 
Were he upon his own to keep his eyes 
And, thus, the higher inspiration lose 
By forcing his attention 'neath command 
Of self — self-centred on its narrow way ! 

How much can the astronomer descry 

Of life and movement in the void of space — 

Working through vital forces all unknown 

To those whose eyes are ever on the ground — 

If he raise not his vision to the sky 

And, with the help of mind, attempt to trace 

The course 'pon which the comet-ball has flown 

Beneath some guiding principle profound ? 

E'en so with us in other walks of life — 
Our eyes firm fixed 'pon some restricted plan 
That seems to lead us nearer to the goal 
Of earth ambition, satisfied desire — 
With thoughts confined to petty, present strife, 
We miss the broader view and fail to scan 
The truths clear' written on the Nature scroll 
Because we fail to lift our vision higher. 



[186] 



'Tis the old story taught to us in youth 
When — little children at our mother's knee — 
We heard with childish wonder and surprise 
Of muck-rake man, by earthly craving led, 
Who raked the mire for some chance grain of 

truth, 
And with his down-cast glance refused to see 
The vision that had surely met his eyes 
Had they been, for a moment, raised o'erhead ! 

How true, as then, the parable is now ! 

For still our thoughts are centred on the mire 

Of things material for which we strain, 

And which e'er seem to hover just ahead — 

The close pursuit of which doth not allow 

Our thoughts to higher standards to aspire 

And, by so doing, help us to attain 

What we might reach were eyes turned up instead ! 



[187] 



THE VISION OF REFORM 

" Every reform or change believed to be reform has been 
surrounded with a cloud of illusion. Men have been asked 
to support it not because it vi^as a reform, but because 
it was a panacea, a way to the millennium. When the re- 
form has been made the world may have been changed, but 
not cured. . . . No reform ever came about in the precise 
shape formulated by its apostles; and when, if ever, so- 
cialism comes about, the men who dreamed and toiled and 
suffered for it will not recognize it." — (From editorial in 
" New York Times," January 1, 1917.) 

How true it is that never doth reform 

Follow the way it seemed at first to lead 

When viewed beneath the pressure of the storm 

Which first had cast unto the winds the seed 

That was to generate in future act 

And strive some human evil to o'erthrow, 

But which, at this stage, fuller knowledge lacked 

Of where 'twould fall, or how indeed 'twould grow ! 

For human progress is a winding lane. 

With many a bend and twist and sudden turn, 

And what, at first, seemed right may prove but 

vain. 
And that now grasped we later may but spurn 
When fuller light along the way doth show 
The object more distinctly to our sight, 
The while our minds, through evolution, grow 
To fuller understanding of the Right. 
'Twas ever thus, and ever so 'twill be 
While mind can grow and spirit can aspire 
And o'er their own mistakes climb ever higher 
'Pon the long journey through eternity! 
[188] 



For if we now could glimpse the distant goal 
Towards the which our faltering steps we bend 
What Avould be left that time could still unroll 
And keep unrolling till the endless end? 

Reform is like a rainbow in the sky 

Whose nether tips to childhood's simple thought 

Seem 'pon the bosom of the earth to lie 

And point to gold that can be found, if sought ; 

But, as we grow to fuller thought, we learn 

That this is but a pretty dream of youth 

And that the gold but represents the Truth 

For which the human mind doth ever yearn ! 

And as the bow recedes as fast as we 

Advance to grasp, by aspiration led. 

So too a true reform must ever be 

A beckoning shape upon the path ahead ! 

" Hope springs eternal in the human breast," 

And man is ever prone to think that he 

Millennium itself at times can see 

The which, if gained, would grant eternal rest. 

But Nature wills it not that strife should cease. 

And deems that peace would thus be dearly bought 

If constant effort e'er should gain release 

By full attainment of the object sought. 

Change, change and ever change, is Nature's way ; 

Through change she ever holds us 'neath her 

sway; 
By change her wond'rous miracles are wrought ; 
And, in the fleeting compass of his day, 
Through change is man to higher levels brought ! 
[189] 



E'en so with socialism we shall find 
That we, as yet, but dimly sense the course 
That it must follow as the human mind 
And heart exert their more developed force, 
In common unison, to right the wrong 
That seems the right because accepted now — 
To guard the weak from the aggressive strong. 
And take the stand that we cannot allow 
A selfish egotism to control 
What's meant for all — not only for the few — 
The which denies to many a human soul 
The share of happiness that is its due. 
But this will not be done by taking from 
The worthy strong what he can rightly use 
And giving to unworthy weak the sum 
That, so acquired by him, could but abuse 
And render sterile Nature's mighty plan — 
Exemplified in everything below — 
That, through consistent effort only, man 
To higher standards of the mind may grow. 
But such a fear is largely held by those 
Who, holding more than their allotted share 
Of earthly goods, the mortgage would foreclose 
And cause some other than themselves to bear 
Their just proportion of the common woes ; 
For by their act they do in fact insist — 
Howe'er they may deplore the use of might — 
That human justice doth, indeed, consist 
But in possession — that this grants a right 
That naught in nature should attempt resist. 
Some rights man has, which no one should gainsay, 
[190] 



And which he should defend with all his force 
If he indeed would follow Nature's way 
And trim his sail to her appointed course; 
But, guarding these, he never should forget 
That still his duty is but incomplete — 
That Right by Obligation is offset, 
The which it is his privilege to meet ; — 
His privilege, if viewed in proper light — 
His duty, if he cannot see it so — 
Which he should ne'er resist in selfish fight 
If he would still advance, progress and grow ! 
And something in his soul must surely tell 
Him who would set and steer his course aright 
That all possessions he doth not use well 
Are obligations rather than a right — 
That all he squanders in a selfish cause. 
His higher aims and purposes, defeat — 
Providing obstacles to Nature's laws. 
Incurring debt that he must surely meet ! 

True socialism will at last be found 
To be no scheme that takes the just desert 
From him who Avorks, 'pon some fantastic ground. 
To give to slothfulness it would pervert 
Thereby to less of effort than before ; 
But, rather, deeper feeling for distress — 
A sense that recognizes more and more 
Another's right to fuller happiness ; — 
And, with this, a determination strong 
To view the matter in unselfish light. 
Nor lend our aid to perpetrate a wrong 
[191] 



Because our legal statutes grant the right. 
Thus, as we slowly mount upon the way 
Of evolution of the soul and mind, 
The light of Truth e'er sheds a brighter ray, 
And the reform once sought we come to find 
Doth not possess the merit we had thought, 
When viewed by higher standards of the soul. 
And that, still far ahead, the distant goal 
Yet holds the ideals we have ever sought 
And so shall do till time shall cease to roll! 



[192] 



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